"Having been in the basketball business for decades as a coach, I really don't understand. Playing this kind of fierce confrontation game, the free throws and fouls on both sides should be about the same, but today the opponent made 40 free throws, we made 25 free throws, and the final score gap between the two sides is also very small, quite intriguing, we will go back and summarize it ourselves. ”

On December 12, after the Shandong men's basketball team lost to the Liaoning men's basketball team at home, Ding Wei, the head coach of the Shandong men's basketball team, publicly questioned the referee's decision.

Coincidentally. Two days ago, Qiu Biao, the head coach of the Xinjiang men's basketball team, also said something similar after the game with the Qingdao men's basketball team, "Maybe I still have less knowledge in my 20-year basketball career, and I need to improve myself and improve myself."

According to the technical statistics of this game, the free throw ratio of Xinjiang men's basketball team and Qingdao men's basketball team in the first half was 3:16, and after the third quarter of the game, this set of numbers became 3:6, and the final whistle sounded, and the number of free throws made by the two teams was fixed at 28:12.

On December 12, the second phase of the 1-2023 CBA League kicked off - 2024 games in 3 days, including exciting battles and warm moments. For example, the Liaoning men's basketball team relied on its tenacious will and strong self-confidence to complete a 15-point reversal away from home and defeat the Beijing Control men's basketball team. In the Xinjiang men's basketball team's away game with the Jilin team, the Jilin men's basketball team prepared a special link to welcome Jones, a meritorious foreign aid who previously played for the team, back to Changchun.

It is also impossible to ignore the fact that in just a few days, multiple head coaches have publicly commented on the referee's on-the-spot decision, which is rare in the history of the CBA.

But realistically speaking, the complaints of coaches also have their own mentality and position factors. Qiu Biao led the team to play away, and the difference in the number of free throws was so huge that it was bound to cause dissatisfaction. Ding Wei led the team to encounter a strong opponent at home, and the team's performance was remarkable, but the result of the game was unsatisfactory, coupled with the team's poor record this season, personal pressure, and it is reasonable to be too sensitive to on-the-spot blowing.

In fact, the head coach's complaints about the referee's decision have been met with mixed reactions from fans on social media. In particular, the fans' attitude towards Ding Wei's complaints about the referee's penalty is almost one-sided - "(Liaoning) has 16 more rebounds, which is the key to losing" "In the last two minutes, Shandong fouled tactics, and Liaoning made six or seven more free throws"...

Of course, this is not to say that the referees of the CBA league have met the requirements and standards of the professional league.

An icy statistic is in front of us: in this year's Men's Basketball World Cup, the Chinese men's basketball team averaged 5.22 fouls per game in five games, ranking third among all participating teams. The Japanese men's basketball team, which qualified directly for the Paris Olympics, averaged just 0.15 fouls per game, the fewest of any of the 4 participating teams.

This leads to a number of issues: whether the use of actions by Chinese athletes is reasonable, whether Chinese players are suitable for the scale of blowing penalties in international competitions, and whether the blowing penalties of referees in the CBA league follow the direction and requirements of international competitions, all of which need to be further explored.

In fact, when coaches keep complaining about the referee's blowing penalty, it just reflects the current predicament of Chinese basketball - some of the athletes' actions themselves do not conform to the rules of basketball, and the referee will question the referee's decision even if it is correct, because the positions of each team are different. In addition, the level of domestic referees is indeed limited, and they cannot be in line with the international arena in time, resulting in controversial decisions from time to time, and thus forming a vicious circle.

"It's been more than 10 rounds of league play, so we should give the fans some smooth games whether we win or lose. I don't know if the relevant departments have seen so many problems in these games, whether their level is in line with the level of our CBA league and the requirements of fans. We have an obligation and responsibility not to make too many low-level mistakes. It is incomprehensible that some mistakes still exist after so many years, and Chinese basketball has come to this day, if there are still such low-level mistakes, it is indeed not in line with the law of basketball development. Ningbo men's basketball coach A Dijiang's words were helpless, but they also showed the current predicament of Chinese basketball.

Is there a problem with the CBA referee's decision? The answer is yes. Because no matter how good the referee is, the penalty will not be 100% correct. However, while improving the professional level of referees, how to abandon the so-called home-and-away thinking and local protection thinking, coaches and athletes start from the basketball rules themselves to make an objective evaluation of the referees' on-the-spot judgments, which is also a top priority. From this point of view, the CBA league urgently needs to stand at the height of Chinese basketball and re-examine the contradiction between referees' judgments and practitioners' perception of penalties.

Beijing, December 12

China Youth Daily, China Youth Network reporter Yang Tui Source: China Youth Daily