Football and COVID-19: the effects of the pandemic on training and performance of South American and Brazilian referees

ABSTRACT

The effects caused by the COVID-19 pandemic impacted the most diverse areas of society, including sport. During the quarantine period, there were several movements to confront the pandemic, which included advances, setbacks and attempts to resume daily activities and sports. In the sports scene, we observed the suspension, postponement or cancellation of the most important international level competitions; football and those involved in it were aware of this process. Considering this, we seek to present the training and maintenance of the activities of football referees during quarantine, projecting a future scenario by fostering debates about what might be the possible changes in the preparation and performance of these officials in South America and, specifically, in Brazil, after the COVID-19 pandemic.

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank the Academic Publishing Advisory Center (Centro de Assessoria de Publicação Acadêmica, CAPA – www.capa.ufpr.br) of the Federal University of Paraná (UFPR) for assistance with English language translation and editing.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

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33. Video tests are evaluations in which the referee analyzes a selected video and defines what decisions they would make, whether there was a foul or not, which card would apply, among other types of bids, placing himself in the position of the referee on the field.

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