Yup, .......they can be a feisty lot!
US parents play dirty when children are on sports fieldFROM LAURA PEEK IN WASHINGTON
AMERICAN parents are so desperate for their children to win sporting events that they are lashing out at coaches, referees and even other parents. The National Alliance for Youth Sports is meeting today to tackle the problem of “sideline rage”. Parental violence on the touchlines is sweeping America, says the alliance, which has recorded brawls, beatings and sabotage at sporting events for children as young as four. The aim of the two-day National Summit on Raising Community Standards in Children’s Sports is to create national guidelines to restrict parental outbursts. Fred Engh, head of the alliance, said that coaches were being intimidated, referees assaulted and children injured by parents. In the worst case a father was beaten to death while supervising his son’s hockey game in Massachusetts last July. Another father is awaiting trial for manslaughter. A man in California was recently sentenced to 45 days in jail for beating up a coach who took his 11-year-old son out of a baseball game. In New Mexico, a dentist sharpened the face guard of his son’s football helmet so that he could slash opposing players. Five players and a referee were injured. In another recent case, a parent poisoned an entire youth football team while trying to get back at a player who had picked on his 12-year-old son. Dr Dan Wann, Professor of Psychology at Murray State University in Kentucky and an expert on spectator violence, who will be addressing the alliance, said: “I have coached, played and umpired and I have a six-year-old in soccer and baseball and I’m just amazed at what I see.”
http://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/0,,3-2001193834,00.html
ISP