Effects of a Ten Week Training Programme on Repeated High Intensity Intermittent Runs among Football Referees of Malaysia

Subramaniam Nathan & Balbir Singh Gill,

Sports Centre, University of Malaya

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

ABSTRACT

The objective of this study was to investigate the effectiveness and acceptability of a 10 week training programme to improve repeated high intensity intermittent runs of football referees in Malaysia. Sixty national football referees were randomly assigned into 3 groups (n=20 each group) namely the control group, experimental group one and experimental group two. Experimental group one followed a planned 10 week training programme (duration of training 4 days in a week, each session=90 minutes and time 5 pm) supervised by a physical education lecturer and his assistants. Experimental group two also reported for training at a different venue and trained on their own (duration, frequency and time of training similar to experimental group one). The design of this study focused upon the individual performances in the pre-test, providing training for 10 weeks and determining if the referees improved as a result of treatment.  A mixed between-within subject analysis known as split-plot ANOVA (SPANOVA) was used to test the hypothesis. The null hypothesis was rejected [F (2, 57) =75.86 p<0.05].  However, the results of Pillai’s Trace and Tukey Pair Wise Multiple Comparison further confirmed the results of SPANOVA. Tukey Pair Wise Multiple Comparisons among groups indicated that the performance of all the three differed from one another with experimental group one showing the best performance and the control group the poorest and the training method used by experimental group one was the best. The results provided meaningful support that a planned10 week training programme was acceptable to improve performance in repeated high intensity intermittent runs. The training programme therefore, could be adopted as a formal training programme for football referees.

Keywords: repeated high intensity intermittent runs, national football referees, ten week  training  programme.