1989: The David Elleray experiment

When Amazon Prime footage emerged recently on Twitter of a referee officiating a French Ligue 1 fixture, the brief clip gave us all a fascinating insight into the role of match day officials. Communicating with colleagues, players and managers, while trying to make crucial decisions that could impact the course of a match and/or season, you wonder why people put themselves through this.

This is what referees really say to footballers during a game... 🗣️

A fascinating insight from Ligue 1! 👀🇫🇷 pic.twitter.com/jfBcyhSe0g

— Amazon Prime Video Sport (@primevideosport) April 18, 2023

Undoubtedly there is a gap in the market for a documentary of this nature. A series following officials around at various levels of the game would be interesting and might make a few of us a feel a bit more sympathy towards these pilloried individuals. The job of a referee and assistant seems a thankless task.

There is a previous example of a referee walking out to the centre circle with a hidden microphone attached. A famous experiment carried out in February 1989 that certainly made an impression and opened a few eyes as to what it takes to try officiate a football match. David Elleray was about to take centre stage.

1988/89: Everton v Arsenal

Maybe the Propellerheads and Shirley Bassey knew their ball, as the kids may or may not say now, in respect to Arsenal's 2022/23 season. "The word is about, there's something evolving. But to me it seems quite clear, that it's all just a little bit of history repeating."

You may be wondering if the introduction above is one of those legendary unfathomable clues on 321, yet it really is just my ham-fisted way of drawing comparisons with Arsenal's forthcoming match at Goodison Park and their Division One fixture at the same ground in January 1989. Because, in certain regards, what is evolving at Arsenal in 2023 does have elements of history repeating itself.