Question Number: 21605

Law 12 - Fouls and Misconduct 6/30/2009

RE: Under 13

Peter Healey of Melbourne, VIC Australia asks...

3 times in the girls u12 game the ref gave free kicks against our team for the girls calling 'mine' . This makes no sense to me . Please explain

Answer provided by Referee Gary Voshol

The ref fell into the trap of a myth.

There is no prohibition against calling 'Mine' or 'Leave it' or any other direction to your own team. It becomes unsporting behavior when you make your calls in an attempt to deceive your opponent.

This seems to come from the Mother Country, where some have even come up with the title of 'verbal impeding' for the supposed offense. You also hear, 'Put a name on it.' But if both sides have a Peter, and you call out 'Peter's ball', mightn't you not be doing that to deceive the Peter on the other side? Or if you screamed 'Peter's ball!' in the opponent's ear, wouldn't that be unsporting even if you were using your name?

Now the ref in your girls game made another creative mistake. If indeed he thought calling 'Mine' was unsporting, why were the girls not cautioned? If you don't caution, you can't award a free kick. There is no free kick offense in the Laws having to do with talking - any free kick is associated with a foul, infraction or misconduct. Without misconduct in this situation, you don't have a free kick. So this referee misapplied the Laws of the Game, and made the game protestable.

I would suggest the team coach contact the powers that be in your league to try to get this referee sorted out.

Answer provided by Referee Keith Contarino

It makes no sense to you because it makes no sense period. There's no misconduct called 'yelling for the ball' Yet, there is a widespread myth, mainly in England but apparently in OZ also, that merely asking for the ball by saying 'mine' or 'leave it' somehow is unsporting behavior. This is utter nonsense. The misconduct only occurs if the player in question somehow deceives or otherwise disadvantages an opponent. If he yells loudly to distract the opponent this may qualify or if he yells 'mine to keep an opponent from collecting the ball, he may have committed unsporting behavior.

This is misconduct and punishable by a caution and showing of the yellow card, not just an indirect free kick

Answer provided by Referee Jason Wright

I agree with my colleagues. It's a peculiar myth in the game - and unfortunate that referees also fall into the trap of believing these myths. This in turn perpetuates the myth - and often it's as simple as the referee not being told otherwise and not even thinking to question it.

The referee cannot award an indirect free kick for saying 'mine', 'leave it', 'Ive got it' or any other such saying without cautioning, there is simply no provision in the laws for it. As such, he would only caution if it is unsporting. What would make such an act unsporting? If it's done to deceive an opponent, then that may be considered unsporting by the referee - which means a card would follow. Without that unsporting element - and the card - there can be no free kick.

If you respectfully contact your association they may be able to take that into consideration and take measures to educate the official.

At least you know that you can make sure your players don't buy the myth though!

The following questions were asked as a follow up to the above question...

See Question: 31591