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I descended to the cellar, dusted off the scales I had avoided for a long time and glanced at the display: 99.2kg. Over the past eight years, I had dropped nearly 10kg. I had transformed from being a official who was bulky and unfit to being slender and conditioned. It had taken time, full of patience, hard calls and priorities. But it was also the beginning of a change that gradually meant stress, pressure and disquiet around the tests that the top management had introduced.

You didn't just need to be a skilled referee, it was also about prioritising diet, presenting as a premier referee, that the weight and adipose levels were appropriate, otherwise you risked being penalized, being allocated fewer games and ending up in the cold.

When the regulatory group was overhauled during the 2010 summer season, the leading figure brought in a series of reforms. During the first year, there was an strong concentration on physique, measurements of weight and body fat, and required optical assessments. Optical checks might seem like a expected practice, but it wasn't previously before. At the training programs they not only evaluated basic things like being able to decipher tiny letters at a certain distance, but also targeted assessments adapted for professional football referees.

Some umpires were found to be color deficient. Another was revealed as blind in one eye and was forced to quit. At least that's what the gossip suggested, but everyone was unsure – because regarding the results of the vision test, nothing was revealed in larger groups. For me, the optical check was a reassurance. It indicated expertise, thoroughness and a aim to enhance.

Regarding body mass examinations and fat percentage, however, I largely sensed aversion, frustration and embarrassment. It wasn't the tests that were the issue, but the way they were conducted.

The first time I was compelled to undergo the degrading process was in the autumn of 2010 at our regular session. We were in Ljubljana, Slovenia. On the opening day, the officials were split into three groups of about 15. When my group had entered the large, cold meeting hall where we were to assemble, the leadership instructed us to strip down to our underclothes. We exchanged glances, but no one reacted or dared to say anything.

We carefully shed our attire. The previous night, we had obtained specific orders not to eat or drink in the morning but to be as empty as we could when we were to undergo the test. It was about showing minimal weight as possible, and having as low a fat percentage as possible. And to resemble a official should according to the paradigm.

There we stood in a lengthy queue, in just our underclothes. We were Europe's best referees, professional competitors, inspirations, mature individuals, caregivers, strong personalities with great integrity … but nobody spoke. We scarcely glanced at each other, our gazes flickered a bit nervously while we were invited two by two. There the chief scrutinized us from head to toe with an frigid stare. Silent and attentive. We stepped on the scale one by one. I contracted my stomach, adjusted my posture and stopped inhaling as if it would make any difference. One of the coaches audibly declared: "Eriksson from Sweden, 96.2kg." I felt how the chief stopped, observed me and surveyed my almost bare body. I mused that this lacks respect. I'm an grown person and compelled to remain here and be inspected and judged.

I stepped off the balance and it appeared as if I was disoriented. The equivalent coach advanced with a kind of pliers, a device similar to a truth machine that he commenced pressing me with on different parts of the body. The caliper, as the tool was called, was chilly and I flinched a little every time it pressed against me.

The trainer squeezed, tugged, forced, quantified, rechecked, spoke unclearly, pressed again and pinched my dermis and adipose tissue. After each test site, he announced the metric reading he could gauge.

I had no clue what the values stood for, if it was favorable or unfavorable. It lasted approximately a minute. An aide inputted the figures into a record, and when all four values had been calculated, the record rapidly computed my overall body fat. My result was declared, for all to hear: "Eriksson, 18.7%."

Why did I not, or anyone else, say anything?

Why didn't we stand up and say what everyone thought: that it was demeaning. If I had voiced my concerns I would have at the same time signed my career's death sentence. If I had questioned or resisted the methods that Collina had introduced then I wouldn't have got any fixtures, I'm convinced of that.

Naturally, I also desired to become in better shape, reduce my mass and achieve my objective, to become a top-tier official. It was obvious you ought not to be above the ideal weight, similarly apparent you ought to be conditioned – and certainly, maybe the complete roster of officials demanded a standardization. But it was wrong to try to achieve that through a humiliating weigh-in and an agenda where the primary focus was to reduce mass and minimise your fat percentage.

Our biannual sessions subsequently followed the same pattern. Weigh-in, body fat assessment, running tests, regulation quizzes, evaluation of rulings, collaborative exercises and then at the end a summary was provided. On a file, we all got information about our body metrics – indicators showing if we were going in the correct path (down) or incorrect path (up).

Body fat levels were categorised into five groups. An acceptable outcome was if you {belong