Foot question

[refnrev]

This sounds wierd and kind of gross, but I'm curious. Does refereeing soccer play havoc on your feet? I don't mean serious injuries. The first game of every season I get blood and water pooled under all of the toenails. I clip them and it drains. But every season I will lose the big toenails from both feet. The old one falls off and a new one has started in under it. I know when I am inspecting the field and the players are getting dressed I see a lot of players with several totally black toenails. Some of my partners when they show up for a game wearing slides have the same kinds of thing too, but I never ask about it. And yes, my shoes fit perfectly so isn't anything like that? Is it just me or does this happen to any of you, too?

[ref2coach]

refnrev I have had had this happen in the past. I found that for me it is when I work 2 or more, back to back, games in "soccer" cleats or "soccer" turf shoes.

I changed to wearing New Balance cross trainers as my primary referee shoe. I have not "bruised" a toe nail bed since limiting my wearing of "soccer" shoes, to no more than 1 game in any given day.

[Nevadaref]

This has never happened to me while officiating soccer. However, I have had it happen twice from basketball officiating. The problem for me was that my sock was bunching up in the toe area of the shoe and creating a continual pushing up of the toenail. This lifting of the nail causes the blood to pool underneath as it tears away from the skin, so it blackens and eventually falls off.
What you need to do is change your socks more frequently so that they don't get as wet and scrunch forward to your toe area. I would guess that if you swap socks at halftime or between games, if you have more than one, then this problem will cease. It worked for me.

I've had a similar problem after playing basketball or soccer. Usually it's because my toenails were too long and the shoes were jamming against them. Make sure they're trimmed well before the first game and it should help.
A different pair of shoes might help too.