Question Number: 15280

Mechanics 4/25/2007

Bill Sayre of Greenwood, SC USA asks...

This question is a follow up to question 15249

Re: Question 15249. I liked your responses very much. I just wanted to get your take on the other side of the coin, so to speak.

The writer stated that the defender went down not as a result of the play against the attacker. Maybe they pulled up lame for some reason, or just maybe they saw an opportunity to kill an attack with a phantom injury (read "dive")? The writer did not say if the "injury" was in fact serious enough to require attention.

Of course, if the defender blew out a knee or something of that kind, any competent referee, seeing this, would lay on the whistle hard and fast and the restart was then correct (no goal, drop ball). The AR apparently judged the injury serious enough to note, and the CR then apparently agreed this qualified for a stoppage. Their match, their decision.

I may be too cynical, but the defender suddenly going down without being touched smacks of USB to me; especially when the defender's condition was not even mentioned.

Comments?

Answer provided by Referee Chuck Fleischer

Isn't the offense "taking a dive/simulation/unsporting behavior" something that if caught and punished for warrants a caution and an indirect free kick? If that denied a goal isn't that a sending-off offense? Yeah, it is -- but I didn't go there... could have -- but didn't.

Regards,

Answer provided by Referee Gary Voshol

Obviously we don't want to encourage dives. We have to carefully discern between a true injury and a fake. That's why they pay us the "big bucks".