My Journey – Dave Cormie

Scottish Volleyball is delighted to announce International Referee Candidate Dave Cormie has completed his required matches to achieve his full International Candidacy.

Below is a journey of Dave’s nomination to achieving full intnerational status.

IRCC in October 2015

IRCC

First match at The Pleasance – CEV U19 Women’s Small Countries Finals (a 5 setter!!) with Loic Queste (FRA)

First Match

First match abroad – RSR Walfer (top team in Luxembourg) v Chaumont (top of Pro A league in France), CEV, men’s Challenge Cup along with Tom Kirtz (LUX, CEV Supervisor) and Vladimir Bosenko (UKR).

First Match Abroad

Second tournament (joint tournament for U19 men and U18 women, round 2 of European championships), coin toss for winner takes all match in tThe men’s competition along with Sebastian Widlarz (ENG)

During my first match at this tournament I gained the final signature I required to be nominated as an international referee, a nice touch being that the other referee in the match was Dominga Lot (ITA) who was on my IRCC. As the appointments continued I have gained more confidence officiating at a higher level than I was previously used to, I’m getting used to larger crowds (or let’s face it any crowd at all!) and getting used to the technology that is constantly being introduced to the matches at the highest level and slowly filtering down through to all other competitions. My last game was in Belgium – despite cancelled flights and missing the technical meeting it was a great trip.

Pre match – Asterix Avo Beveren – Vasas Óbuda Budapest with Raquel Portela (POR) and Savvas Iodanidis (GRE, CEV Supervisor)

Over the years refereeing in Scotland I have learned from some very experienced referees in addition to having some firsthand knowledge of rule interpretation. Travelling abroad to officiate has provided me with further feedback from other very experienced current and ex-international referees. I have learned some important lessons and thoroughly enjoyed my time referring, meeting new people from different cultures and representing the SVA. Now that I have received my nomination I hope that I can continue to get some good appointments within the CEV and who knows, maybe some FIVB appointments one day – you’ve got to aim big!

I owe a lot of how far I have progressed to date to several people within the SVA and most notably the referee’s commission, should there be anyone out there who has aspirations of being an international referee please feel free to get in touch with the SVA office who can pass on my contact details.