Problem & Need Statement

1. Assessment of Soccer Referee Proficiency in Time-Sensitive Decision-Making Nathan Jones, Andrew Cann, Saud Almashhadi, Hina Popal System Engineering & Operations Research, George Mason University Problem & Need Statement Method of Analysis Context Analysis Part I: Soccer Game Simulator Referee Call Making Process • Junior level referees do not receive assessments for game flow understanding or fitness attributes as predictors of call accuracy. An assessment method is needed to evaluate junior referees based on fitness and/or game flow understanding attributes. Simulation developed in Java A two part analysis was conducted to determine alternative utilities: Utility is defined as the average call accuracy of the top 100 junior referees identified using each alternative. Part I: A regression for call accuracy based on fitness and GFU developed using a discrete event soccer game simulator. Part II: Utility of each alternative determined through a Monte Carlo analysis using regression from part I. Results Part I: Soccer Game Simulator Fitness and GFU range from 0 (worst possible) to 100 (best possible) Simulation output regression analysis (R2 = 99.51): Call Accuracy (Fitness, GFU) = 0.713491 + 0.000923486 Fitness + 1.28791e-5 GFU - 6.4846e5 Fitness2 + 1.12504e-6 GFU2 + 1.26193e-6 Fitness3 - 6.75305e-9 Fitness4 Part II: Monte Carlo Analysis Conclusions & Further Findings Recommendation Further Findings I: Impact of Teams It is not cost effective to implement fitness tests on junior referees. Further Findings II: Recommendation When evaluating referee quality based on game performance, team combination must be considered as a potential confounding variable in the analysis. Team combination and game flow have a significant impact on referee call accuracy. “Fitness Test” dominates all other assessment based alternatives.