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Referees

Name Base
Steve Baines Chesterfield

Reading games he has refereed (may not be complete):

Date Result Comments
7/11/1998 Reading 3 Bournemouth 3 Gave Bournemouth a penalty for an outrageous dive
14/8/1999 Cambridge United 3 Reading 1  
2/9/2000 Port Vale 0 Reading 1  
5/3/2003 Norwich City 0 Reading 1  

Other comments:

Steve Baines was formerly a professional footballer. Frequently people can be heard saying that there should be more referees like him. Well, all I can say is look at the video of the Reading v Bournemouth game on 7/11/1998 and tell me how a former professional footballer can fall for the con job that Mark "Diving Cheat" Stein came up with for Bournemouth's second goal. Baines should have been dismissed from the referees' list for that one horrendous error alone.

Baines is an insurance broker in Chesterfield, and is also a member of the fans' committee that runs the corrupt Derbyshire club. So his decisions in any game that affect Chesterfield's league position have to be called into question as well.

The good news is that on 15th December, 2001 I heard that Baines had decided to retire from refereeing. I hope the report was true and if so it is not a moment too soon. (Unfortunately, it wasn't true then, but I now hear that he is to retire at the end of the the 2002/03 season.)

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