NORFOLK HOCKEY UMPIRING ASSOCIATION

History

The NHUA was founded on 2nd January 1996 following a merger between the then Norfolk County Hockey Umpires Association (founded so long ago nobody can remember when!) and the Norfolk Women's Hockey Umpires Association (founded 1990). For a while we had men's and women's sections looking after their own appointments. Since 1999 both sections have been totally integrated and run as one, thus saving on administration and making better use of umpiring resources. At the 2006 AGM it was agreed to change the name of the association. The word "umpiring" is to imply, suggest and in fact signal that the association is there for everyone interested in umpiring and not just a cosy "club" for umpires.

Membership

Membership is open to all umpires. The annual subscription is currently £5 per season payable on the 1st October. Level-1 (and above) and L1 candidate umpires are covered by our third party/public liabilty insurance scheme. Benefits of NHUA membership, associate members are not insured by the NHUA.

NHUA Officers

President: Peter Lemon 01553 844572

Garden House, Rectory Lane, North Runcton, King's Lynn, PE33 0QS

e-mail:- peter@middaggs.co.uk

Secretary: Andy Marshall 01603 260584

9 Longdale, Drayton, Norwich, NR8 6AD

e-mail :- a_marshall@talktalk.net

Treasurer & Chief Umpiring Coach: Mike Pepper 01502 741570

8 Durrants Close, Kessingland, Lowestoft, Suffolk, NR33 7PB

email:- mikehpepper@hotmail.com

Membership Secretary - Level-1 Administrator: Alan Jones 01603 747956

Witts End, 11 Breydon Drive North, Costessey, Norwich, NR8 5BB

e-mail :- alan.jones@bbsrc.ac.uk or alan@wittsend.co.uk

Neutral Pool Secretary: Ashley Rex 07795 564866

17 Juniper Close, Thetford, Norfolk, IP24 2YG

e-mail:- thetfordrhino@hotmail.com

 Young Umpire Officer: vacant

Council Member: Sheila George 01493 752189

Englands Farm House, 1 George Lane, Acle, Norfolk, NR13 3DR

e-mail :- smg.68@btinternet.com

Coaching Co-ordinators

 Council Member: Vaughan Dearling 01953 483736

Kiribati House, The Green, Cashton, Attleborough, Norfolk, NR17 1DB

e-mail:- vucdearling@hotmail.com

and

Council Member: Trevor Norman 07940 493032

22 High Road, Wortwell, Harleston, Norfolk, IP20 0HH

e-mail:- trevordnorman@hotmail.com

NHA County Discipline Officer: Julia Hutchinson 01603 411924

Shipfield, Norwich, NR3 4DX.

e-mail :- jules-hutchinson@tiscali.co.uk

If you have a Red Card incident, don't panic - phone Julia as soon as possible, and all will be explained to you....

A very brief report (unofficial) of our AGM held on May 7th 2009, at TRF, Beech Road, Taverham, Norwich.

It was a disappointing turnout of members this year - 15 in all. Our President welcomed everyone and thanked those on the council for their help and support over the past year. The Secretary reported that there had been no major problems this year.

The Treasurer reported that we were solvent, in fact we are slightly better off than last year. There was no need to change the subscription rate (£5). It was agreed to keep the match fee at £15.

Pool Secretary reported that the appointments had gone as well as expected with the limited resources available.

Our Secretary of many years, Rod Larwood is standing down for a well earned rest. We wish Rod well in his "retirement", he'll still be about umpiring and we thank him for his service to the association and keeping us orgainsed so effectively.

We are still looking to find a Young Umpire Development Officer.

Karren Young is our Norfolk Hockey Development Officer and has found her feet and has become a valuable assesset to the organising of Hockey developement programmes in the county. All the details of which can be found on the web site.

The Membership Secretary reported a steady growth in the association's membership, currently at 375. This includes 121 L1 umpire candidates.

The meeting finished at 8:35pm.

Dates of NHUA Council Meetings for 2009/2010

T.B.A.

Date of 2010 AGM - T.B.A.

Venues at TRF, Norwich. starting at 7:30pm

What is the status of the NHUA?

NHUA is part of the Norfolk Hockey Association. This association is merger from the old Norfolk Women's Hockey Association (NWHA) and the Norfolk County Hockey Association (NCHA). This was the first such merger in the country.

NHUA operates under article 8 in the new constitution of the NHA which states:-

8. Umpires' Administration

This role will be delegated to the Norfolk Hockey Umpiring Association (NHUA) who undertake:-

8.1 To organise umpires for league matches, as appropriate.

8.2 To foster the coaching and development of individual umpires within the county.

8.3 Develop, implement and monitor plans for recruitment, education and assessment of umpires and umpire coaches.

8.4 Formulate and implement a policy for the selection and appointment of umpires to matches within the county and for the county pool.

It is the policy of the NHUA to embrace the principles of Sports Equity (fairness) as defined by Sport England, and to encourage clubs and schools to do so.

We are proud to have pioneered this first such merger of men's and women's umpiring associations in the country! Our example and experiences are now been followed by other counties, at the regional level the men and women have merged to form the East Region Hockey Umpiring Association (ERHUA) - what Norfolk does today the rest do tomorrow! At national level we are now all part of the England Hockey organisation.

Level-1 Umpires

All Level-1 umpires in Norfolk have a Level-1 Umpiring Match Record Card. This is so they can show, by recording when and who they umpired during the season, that they are currently ACTIVE. Non-active Level-1 umpires will be removed from the Norfolk Level1 Listing. This has now become a Hockey England National requirement. So it is important that you umpire at least 3 games during the season and send the completed match record card (each Norfolk umpire receives a card on receipt of their subscription to NHUA) to Alan Jones our Level-1 Co-ordinator. We don't think that umpiring 3 games is too big a burden to ask of Level-1s. Many players are qualified but never umpire games. Many Level-1s are very competent umpires and they could easily umpire games in higher leagues if they so wished. It is important to umpire games on a regular basis, rules and more often the interpretation of them, are constantly changing. Umpires (and players) need to keep in touch with how the game is developing. Anyone who fails to complete their 3 games may have to be re-assessed by one of our umpire coaches before they can be put back onto the active list. Only active Level-1 umpires can umpire league games where there is a Level-1 requirement. Ideally NHUA would like an umpire coach to look at all our Level-1s during the season, but we just haven't got the resources. Pool umpires are not part of this scheme, most of them umpire many games during a season and are assessed on a regular basis. If you are interested in becoming an umpire or would like more info - contact Alan Jones, details above. If you loose your card, contact Alan Jones.

Gradings

A few seasons ago NHUA introduced an umpire grading system. It's obvious that a Level-1 umpire is not necessarily experienced enough to umpire just any game of hockey. Hockey England have just 3 grades of umpire; the Level-1 grade, Level-2 (Level-2 umpires are those who have been selected for East appointments) and Level-3 (National & International umpires). So you can see Level-1 covers a huge range of leagues/playing standards. A 16 year old who has just passed Level-1 one Saturday is very unlikely to be able to umpire a Men's Div 1 game the next Saturday, and what about the umpire with 10 years experience, umpiring 100 games a season! can they be compared to a Level-1 passee? About 90% of all umpires are Level-1 with no distinction made between their capabilities & experience. League rules say that games must be umpired by a suitable Level-1 umpire. What does that mean? An inappropriate appointment does nothing for the game. It drains the umpire's confidence rapidly, the players get upset that their game may be spoilt and so another umpire is 'lost' from Hockey. NHUA have tried to grade all our Level-1 umpires as to what league games they are deemed capable of umpiring - men's or women's or both. Most members were easy to grade as they were already umpiring games in a particular league quite satisfactory. It is very difficult setting the stagger between men's & women's games, some umpires can cope better with the control issues likely to arise in the men's game, others find the slower pace of the women's game means that they loose concentration. But no system is foolproof and the gradings may well have to be tweaked as we go along.

NHUA aims to assess each member whilst umpiring, twice a year. That's quite an ambitious aim. We need to see that standards & consistency are being maintained, who is improving and needs to go onto the East Umpire Development panel.

All NHUA active members have been notified of their grading via the listing on the web site. Anyone who feels that their grading is inaccurate should contact our secretary. No one should umpire a league game they are not graded to do. The appointing club may well lose league points.

A reasonably up-to-date list of NHUA active umpires is available here. This is NOT the definitive list - contact Alan Jones for current information.

Complaints

Please remember, umpires lose money umpiring, even with an £15.00 match fee. The loss is not just financial, people give up a lot of their spare time (most of Saturday and often Sundays too) to travel and umpire games. So bear this in mind when you feel hard done by the umpires. We can't see everything, especially under flood lights and we do make mistakes (often not as many as the players). I'm not making excuses for bad umpiring. If players actually tried to umpire some games they might start to appreciate some of the problems umpires face every game. Civility and hospitality towards to umpires is an issue, many umpires feel they are not appreciated and this is the one main reason given as to why we lose umpires from the pool.

That said there are sometimes problems with umpires and we need to know about it. So please tell us ....

or

Should anyone wish to make a formal complaint about a Norfolk Umpire they should do so in writing, to the secretary (details above).

Funnily enough we don't get many letters praising umpires!!!