CEFL’s important step towards independent functioning — forming its own Officiating body — will be completed on the last weekend of February, which is when the first CEFL Officiating Clinic will be held in Zagreb.

From February 28th to March 1st, 27 potential officials, not including the Head of CEFL Officiating Michael Ulicny, and Zoran Tadić that will run the clinic, will complete the two month process of officials’ education that has thus been carried out through individual learning of the rules and mechanics and a light test given every 10 days. Of the 27, 12 officials are from Serbia, 8 from Slovenia, and 7 from Croatia.

“We begin at 9.30 with the rules, and we move through the 5-man mechanics all the way to the test, that will be held Sunday morning. After the test, at 2PM, the Silverhawks will arrive for a scrimmage that was arranged for the sole purpose the officials have a practical part of the clinic“, says Damir Župan of the Thunder, who almost by accident became a CEFL official last year, and is now one of the more heavily involved in setting up the organization, and who was responsible for the Croatian candidates.

The final test will determine who is at this point fit to be an official and who in fact will officiate in the 2009 season, or as Župan says, it’s possible some won’t make it. But, he’s very optimistic, because even though most are rookies, there are those with experience, such as himself — from his time in German american football — to several Serbian officials, some of which were already CEFL officials in the first year of competition and of course Ulicny.

“In essence, it’s possible; if someone’s really not well with mechanics, which means that he doesn’t know where he should be, what are the responsibilities on his side etc. it wouldn’t be advisable that he’s allowed to officiate … But of course, we expect that all pass the test, because we’ve been hassling them for two months with studying the rules and the tests we’ve had so far.”

Since the CEFL Officiating will move to 5-man crews completely, the thinking is even if not all of them make it this year, the number will be more than enough to handle all the games, especially with the reduced schedule of games, which is in fact stretched out to even more weeks than in previous years.

The CEFL Officiating adds an important part of the league’s improvement in 2009, a year that features the strongest lineup of teams ever and now the league’s very own officiating body. Since the league was founded, off the field activities were rarely in doubt, and from now on, even those on the field won’t be any more.