My colleague Mitch Phillips wrote this on our blog towards the end of last year:

It was only a few weeks ago that the great and the good of football were talking about the lessons to be learned from the rugby World Cup, where players under just as much pressure but suffering infinitely more physical punishment, retained a respect for officials that utterly shames football by comparison.

Mitch was writing in response to a group of Chelsea players, led by team captain John Terry, who surrounded the referee in the latest example of multi-millionaire players ganging up on an official because of a decision they didn’t like.

The idea that it’s OK to approach the referee in such a way seems to be deeply ingrained in the Premier League and by all accounts, the behaviour is copied by players all the way down to schools football.

It’s refreshing, then, to see a scheme being run by the FA at the amateur level to try to get things moving in the right direction. Play the video above to see a report on a trial that will see the team captains designated as the only players able to talk directly with the referee.

It’s an appealing idea and one the game needs if, in the long term, we’re going to keep referees in soccer. As David Elleray says in the report:

We’re very good at getting people into refereeing but not so good at keeping people as referees and a part of that is the way they’re treated. In the broadest sense it’s the abuse and the unpleasantness they encounter and a lot of them turn around and say, ‘Why do I put up with this?’

So is this something that should be taken up in the Premier League and elsewhere in the professional game? Watch the report from Jim Drury and let us know via the comments.