Interesting to hear from someone who has ref experience. I've been going to football matches for decades and criticism of refs has always been there. Check any fans forum and you'll find the same accusations of incompetence, corruption, the agenda etc. The only thing that has changed imo is that refereeing decisions are now dissected and analysed to a greater degree because there is so much money riding on them. A bad decision can cost a club tens of millions.
I'm usually willing to cut refs some slack, but even I was astonished at the level of competence of Atwell's performance last night. This was compounded by the shifting sands opinions of Peter Walton who, in my experience, has never disagreed with a refereeing decision. The only time he'll say the ref is wrong is when VAR says so. Which means he's still not disagreeing. He's not strong enough for this job. Clearly refs and ex-refs will mix socially and Walton won't want to be seen as the class sneak. But he's happy enough to take the money which is why I have no time for him as a person or his opinions. (Maybe no ex-ref is strong enough which makes me wonder whether the Walton role should be scrapped).
Last night was classic. He said the rule in the Cancelo incident was whether the attacking player had control of the ball. If I remember correctly the commentator doubted if he had control. Then, when the red card was upheld, he changed the narrative to "potentially " had control. If that's the rule he should have said so right away. Which demonstrates a lack of expert knowledge and thus his deficiency in his role.
And so it will go on.