Ref Suspended for Using Rock, Paper, Scissors Instead of Coin Toss on Kickoff

Coin beats paper, rock, and scissors it seems. Coin always wins. A referee in the Women’s Super League in England substituted a game of rock, paper, scissors for a coin toss, and is now suffering a suspension for his little bit of improvisation.

According to the Guardian, soccer referee David McNamara left his coin in the locker room before a match, and so he went back to the days of our youth and had Manchester City team captain Steph Houghton and Reading’s Kirsty Pearce play a game of rock, paper, scissors to decide who would start with the ball.

League officials didn’t take kindly to the situation. According to the Guardian, McNamara was suspended 21 days for “not acting in the best interests of the game,” a charge he accepted.

The FA said McNamara did not oversee an official coin toss, which is required under the laws of the game, before Manchester City faced Reading last month in the WSL.

It makes sense that a coin toss would be required in the official rules—you can come up with a bunch of different aberrations in the age-old schoolyard game. But if McNamara ever decides to run the old rochambeau racket ever again, he should at least be required to bring orange slices.