Highlands Soccer Referees Association boss John Burgoyne said Dent’s resignation added to the referees drain.

“He [Dent] was one of our most experienced referees and only Tony Blake has probably done more games than him,” Burgoyne said.

“But hopefully he’s not lost forever and we can get him back on board next year doing assessing and mentoring of the junior referees.”

Burgoyne said the referees association would do its best to cover all remaining matches this season and had recently re-graded a few junior whistleblowers to help fill the void.

Dent took up refereeing as a 40-year old after seeing a young referee being abused by a spectator.

But it was the abuse of a player that played a big part in him retiring.

Earlier this season, Dent was in charge of a first grade match between Exeter and Yerrinbool-Bargo that was abandoned after an on-field incident broke out.

Dent said a player he sent off had refused to leave the pitch, so he was forced to abandon the game because there was no ground official at Exeter Oval.

He said he felt intimated by the player’s action and he realised it wasn’t worth the match fee.

“Do I keep laying it on the line for $48? No thanks,” he said.

Two players were suspended over the incident.

Highlands Soccer Association operations manager Ian Campbell said one player from Exeter was suspended for five weeks for fighting while a Yerrinbool player was handed a 12 month suspension for “intimidating actions” towards the match officials.

Dent said he was disappointed about the sentence handed to the Yerrinbool player, but he understood the tribunal’s position.

“The HSA to their credit couldn’t do anything else,” he said.

“Unfortunately no one came forward and spoke out in support of what we [the officials] had in our statement.”

While the officials alleged the Yerrinbool player verbally abused and pushed a referee’s assistant, the allegation was not backed up by other witness’ reports.