The ultimate, the happiness of the sport that does not have referees: "The players do not need to pretend, nor anyone to deceive"

Football without referees. Without assistants, without fourth referees, without VAR managers, without VAR assistants, without VAR support, but above all without main referee. Football without sanctions or punishments. What would happen? 22 men or 22 women fighting to the death for a ball, violence unleashed, fights everywhere, blood on the grass…. The chaos. But… if not? «In the ultimate there is no referee and nothing happens. The players respect each other, they establish limits between themselves and they do not need to pretend because there is no one to deceive,” explains Juan Rivero, Spanish coach of a sport that has never had referees, controversies or obscure Technical Committees and who has made it a flagship.

In fact, at the end of each tournament, be it a World Cup or a regional competition, the cleanest team receives a larger trophy than the winner.. And who decides which team is the cleanest? Your rivals! It seems like an idyllic game, the benevolence to which the rest must aspire, although it also has its dark side.

Ultimate, to begin with, is a kind of American football with Frisbee. Or a balloon with frisbee. Or football with frisbee. The fact is that with frisbee. On a grass or sand field 100 meters long by 37 meters wide, two teams of seven members each compete to get the puck to a rehearsal area.. Players cannot move with the frisbee in hand, but can make passes in any direction. Whoever reaches 15 touchdowns or whoever has the most after 100 minutes wins. It is simple and, therefore, it is growing. Worldwide there are 304,000 practitioners registered by the International Federation (WFDF), although the majority are concentrated in the United States and Canada.. In Spain there are only 1,366, for example.

How is peace maintained?

Since the sport arrived in Gran Canaria in 1995, ultimate has been developing little by little in the country – there are now 37 clubs – and above all it has advanced in its beach modality, where the team won a silver and a bronze. in the last World Cup. In some schools and universities it is explained and even practiced by its spirit, because it does not need referees, although at the beginning the question always arises. How is peace maintained?

«It is self-arbitration and it works. I started studying INEF, I learned about the sport and I was hooked, but I didn't know that it didn't have referees until I arrived at my first competition.. I had played soccer and I was very surprised. That ended up making me fall in love. In principle, ultimate is a non-contact sport, but we are the players themselves who determine the limits. In a World Cup, for example, you put your elbow in, but the rival allows it, you negotiate it with him,” details Diego Lorenzo, a member of the mixed team that this November in California was proclaimed runner-up in the ultimate beach world championship.

«It is very interesting. We must all know the rules and respect each other and, at the end of the game, we get together to talk about what happened. Then each team gives a score of the opponent's fair play through five points: knowledge of the rules, contact, impartiality, attitude and communication,” says Cristina González, part of the women's team that took bronze in the same World Cup.

“Don't let respect be lost”

The two players highly value “the responsibility” that the absence of a judge places on them, but they also accept that there may be problems. In fact, in ultimate there is only one professional league, the American Ultimate Disc League (AUDL), from the United States and Canada, and there they have already created “observers.”. They are not considered referees, but they signal out-of-bounds or offside and intervene if the players do not agree on a throw.. The cleanest sport can change if the sponsors, the prizes, in short, the money arrive.

“It is clear that we have not tested self-refereeing because here in Europe the ultimate does not feed us,” admits Diego Lorenzo. «I guess it's the future, a mixed model with observers to help. But I hope that respect between rivals is not lost,” says González. “Fair play is part of the ultimate and will continue to be so even if there are observers who intervene more,” concludes coach Rivero. Ultimate, a sport without referees; Utopia is possible, at least still.