Rugby Football Union - Fabulous Forty

Fabulous Forty


	Gwyn Airdrie

Forty years of refereeing and still going strong. That’s the proud - and perhaps, unbeatable - record of popular Warwickshire Society referee, Gwyn Airdrie who has just started his fourth decade with the whistle.

Airdrie, who jokes that he’s probably the only referee to have gone through the grades twice - once up and once down - estimates he’s been the man in the middle of around 2,000 games at all levels during his illustrious career. And he says, “After all that time I am still loving every minute of it. I can count on the fingers of one hand the games that I have not enjoyed.”

Airdrie, a Life Member of the Warwickshire Society of Referees and a former chairman and committee member, took up the whistle when he was 16. From running the line at Sutton Coldfield, his father’s club, he finally wrote to the Warwickshire Society secretary and was invited to attend the AGM. “In those days there were no tests or laws examinations and you just went out and got on with it, “ he says, remembering his first appointment between Coventry Technical College Colts and Nuneaton Colts.

“Because I was so young I had to go everywhere by public transport but the older players always looked after me, taking me out on the town, with one of them being delegated to get me home safely.”

Gwyn clawed his way through the grades, often officiating at schools games in the morning and going on to do a senior game in the afternoon. There was no such thing as ‘fast track’ in those days and he eventually reached the RFU’s ‘A’ List in 1982 after 18 years in the local ranks. He had six years at the top level, pre-leagues, refereeing many of the top clubs and then became one of the first members of the RFU’s touch judge squad. He refereed one of the first women’s internationals between England and Wales at The Reddings. Now he’s back again refereeing amongst the Warwickshire clubs where he started.

On the eve of his 40th season, at the age of 55 he said, “I’ll continue to referee as long as I don’t mess the game up for the players and I continue to enjoy it. It’s given me many hours of sheer enjoyment and I am now refereeing many of the sons of the fathers I refereed in the early stages of my career.”

And his recipe for refereeing success? “Don’t take yourself too seriously. You need a sense of humour on the pitch and to be a good man manager. You can make a good man manager fit but its difficult to make a fit man a good man manager.”.