Blue Army column by Steve Pumfrey: Referee gets a rough ride

For Respect to be successful everyone in football has to play their part in creating a fair, safe and enjoyable environment in which the game can take place.

Those words are taken from the official Respect campaign which was heavily promoted at Leicester City's clash with Newcastle at the Walkers Stadium on Saturday night.

The trouble was that the City fans felt wronged at the time – and wanted to shove the words straight down the throat of referee Andre Marriner.

Talking to a few more fans yesterday morning, their opinion of the referee had changed.

The Richie Wellens dismissal looked correct, they said, and Bruno Berner was fortunate to stay on the pitch.

But they were still claiming a penalty for Andy Carroll's handling a Paul Gallagher free-kick.On the night of the game, all the rancour meant the plan to promote the Respect campaign at the Championship clash backfired horribly.

Manager Nigel Pearson chose his words carefully, but there was no such reservations from the home fans.

"Respect the ref – you're having a laugh," was the loudest cry heard during the first half of the riveting goalless draw.

Marriner, who usually officiates in the Premier League but was taking charge of his first Championship game this season, was an official under siege as the City fans fumed over Wellens's first-half dismissal and another flashpoint when Newcastle's Ryan Taylor escaped punishment for a high challenge on Martyn Waghorn.

Marriner took the precaution of waiting for a couple of City stewards to escort him off the pitch at half-time.

That left the Birch with one of his toughest assignments since he packed up as a player.

His job was to try to promote a campaign which was now being ridiculed by some City fans. Poor Laurence Jones, an honourable man and chief executive of the County FA, was drowned out by boos as he tried to deliver the Respect message.

There is a lot to commend the campaign as it tries to stop about 7,000 referees leaving the sport each year because of abusive behaviour towards them.

It appears to be working, say the FA but, by half-time, the Blue Army seemed to have lost respect for Marriner.

Yet, in a perverse way, this feeling of being wronged also resulted in one of City's best performances in weeks.

A fan who made the trip to Barnsley in midweek said: "I can't believe I'm watching the same team", as the likes of former internationals Alan Smith and Nicky Butt came off a distant second best in the middle of the park and Matty Fryatt's pairing with Waghorn and Paul Gallagher gave City an added dimension in attack.

"That's the best we've played since winning at QPR," said another Kop-ite. City have often disappointed at home, but this time it was different.

The sell-out away end of Newcastle fans helped ensure the Walkers was the noisiest it had been since City lifted the League One title back in April.

The performance matched the occasion, which is vital to City, because these showpiece fixtures against the likes of Newcastle and local rivals Derby and Nottingham Forest usually attract the less devoted supporters.

On many occasions they have probably gone away thinking: "I won't bother again for a bit".

This time, the City players won over the fans with a display of resilience and determination and, of course, the occasional flutter.

The second half was a tense affair. City claimed a penalty when Gallagher's free-kick was deflected to safety off Carroll's arm.

The fans would not have known it at the time, but Marriner did Bruno Berner a huge favour by resisting showing him a second yellow card for a hack on Wayne Routledge which would have left City down with nine men.

The closing minutes were particularly tense.

"Has my watch stopped?" asked one fan as wave after wave of Newcastle pressure was resisted in the final minutes of the half.

Nolberto Solano's brief cameo lifted the atmosphere, and it is rare to see a player get an equally rapturous reception from both sets of supporters.

At the end, Solano and his new team-mates were given a standing ovation as they left the pitch and most of the City supporters making their way down Filbert Way were talking up the second half of the season with renewed optimism.