A MALVERN referee of 28 years has said he abandoned a junior football game because of the aggressive behaviour of players' parents.

While referees are often a target of abuse, Malcolm Murray said the behaviour of Hadley Rangers supporters during a match against Malvern Town Wanderers on Sunday was the worst he had ever seen.

The trouble started, according to Mr Murray, when he asked one of the parents of the under-13s team to move from behind the goal as he believed it was distracting the players.

Mr Murray said the parent refused three requests, so he decided to abandon the match.

He said the pitch was then stormed by angry supporters, who shouted abuse at him.

"In the 50 years I've been involved in football, I've never known such badly behaved parents,"he said.

The problem of aggressive parents at matches had been getting worse over the last two or three years, he said.

"There's so much money in football that all these children think they can go into the multi-million pound bracket and parents are encouraging them in the wrong way.

"They think they're down at Old Trafford with Alex Ferguson," he said.

On Sunday's game, Mercian League chairman George Silverman said he could not comment until the official match report had gone before both the Worcestershire FA and Mercian League management committee.

He added that a committee member had been present at the game.

Mr Murray said that he would not be deterred from refereeing and would continue to stamp down on bad behaviour.

"It will never put me off. I've been involved with football for 50 years and when you've been talked to by people like Dave MacKay and Norman Hunter, I don't think a 13-year-old child will beat me," he said.

Daniel Jones, secretary to Hadley Rangers, said he could not comment on what had happened at the match until they saw the match report.