REFEREES FACE IMPOSSIBLE TASK
There is a popular misconception that the role of England manager is football's impossible job.
It is not. That post has been filled for some time by the Premier League referee.
This week it was Phil Dowd. Last week it was Mark Clattenburg. Next week it will be some other poor sap with a whistle who feels the lash of managers desperate to explain away their team's inadequacies by pointing the finger of blame at the man in the middle rather than their own players.
The referee has become the traffic warden of football, ridiculed, universally hated and whose decisions are often condemned in the heat of the moment when cold analysis might lead to more appropriate conclusions.
Let's take Dowd, whose 'crime' in the eyes of Tottenham and the kangaroo court of satellite television pundits was to send off Robbie Keane for a tackle on Birmingham's Fabrice Muamba.
True, the dismissal was confused by the fact that Dowd walked away from the incident and appeared to have a discussion with the fourth official via his earpiece before producing the red card.
If Dowd had been seeking another opinion then he would have deserved criticism as the moment matters of opinion in football are refereed by committee it is time to start watching another sport.
Dowd, however, apparently claims he was informing the official of his decision in case it prompted anger on the touchline, in which case he is guilty only of confusing body language.
You might agree with Dowd that Keane should have been sent off for a tackle in which feet undeniably were off the ground. You might not. For my part I thought it was harsh.
But consider this. Just a week earlier Sir Alex Ferguson lambasted Clattenburg in such venomous fashion at half-time during Manchester United's defeat at Bolton that he was ordered to sit in the stands.
He was charged by the Football Association and faces a touchline ban. His beef was that Clattenburg was allowing bad tackles to go unpunished.
Ferguson went on to lament poor refereeing in the Premier League and accused referee chief Keith Hackett of not enforcing his own summer initiative.
Ferguson said: "He made a promise to the managers that tackles with raised feet off the ground would be a red card.
"Standards must be slipping because there have been some bad tackles recently, not just in our games but in quite a few others.
"And what happens then if someone gets seriously injured? Who gets the blame? The referee gets the blame."
Can you seriously blame Dowd if he had Ferguson's words - and Hackett's initiative - in his mind when Keane lunged at Muamba.
The point is Premier League managers cannot have it both ways.
They cannot call for action to stamp out dangerous tackles and then accuse referees of incompetence when the rules are applied to their own players.
Except that this is the Premier League where exactly that type of double standard is commonplace.
Just last week Chelsea were charged with failing to control their players and, depressingly, manager Avram Grant claimed his stars had been right to surround referee Andre Marriner against Derby following Michael Essien's last-minute dismissal.
Blackburn's Mark Hughes laid into referee Chris Foy last month after David Dunn was dismissed against Manchester United and Everton's David Moyes faces an FA charge for criticising Clattenburg following the Merseyside derby.
And all the while players continue to hone their diving and play-acting skills to dupe officials.
Referees make mistakes, just like players who misjudge tackles and squander goal chances and managers who select the wrong team and adopt the wrong tactics. And, of course, referees should not be immune from criticism.
But are all England's top officials incompetent? Do they really deserve to be the first port of refuge for knee-jerk managers seeking to pass the responsibility for the failings of themselves and their players?
It is time the job of referee was not rendered virtually impossible by a culture of routine contempt.

By Frank Malley, PA Chief Sports Writer