Question Number: 21934

Law 5 - The Referee 9/11/2009

RE: Under 17

Dave of Des Moines, IA US asks...

Low key club scrimmage game,
Attacker 'a' takes a shot on a break-away.
The last defender in the PA deliberately and blatently raises his hands to deflect the shot and ball lands in front of another attacker 'b' with a clear shot at goal. The goalie is way out of position as he was running toward the original trajectory of the ball. (better opportunity than a PK).
I call advantage. (I know this can be risky) Attacker 'b' shoots, completely satisfying the advantage, ball hits the bar, bounces back into play, and defense gains posession.
I allow play to continue until the ball goes out, and stop play to tell the defender that if this were a real game he would recieve a caution. Restart with the throw-in.
No one watching the game could understand what the heck I was doing, and friends joked that I needed my eyes checked because I missed the 'handball' (it was a very cassual atmosphere).
My question is if a caution would be the correct call or could this have been a red card? Correct restart?
In other words, is a shot that satisfies the advantage 'worth' as much as a goal?
Was this handled correctly?
I thought it was and was very proud of myself even though the rest of the club was still convinced that I needed re-certification.

Answer provided by Referee Dennis Wickham

The better way to handle this:

When the referee sees a foul inside the penalty area, and believes advantage is possible, she should delay the whistle for a moment but NOT give any signal for the advantage. If a goal is scored, the defender avoids a sendoff, the attacking team celebrates, and the referee can be proud.

When a goal is not scored 'right away,' the current advice from USSF in your situation (penalty kick foul, advantage allowed, shot hits goalpost) is to call the foul .

I struggled with this when it first came out. IMO, however, it makes sense. The 'advantage' for the attacking team who is entitled to a penalty kick is a goal, not a shot. If a goal isn't scored within a few seconds, the advantage has not been realized. Blow the whistle, and award the PK.


Note: outside the US, the advice may be different, and a more traditional notion that a shot (unaffected by the original foul) is the advantage realized.

Answer provided by Referee Keith Contarino

Jim Allen at USSF's official Q&A site dealt with this just a few days ago. Here's part of his answer:

'In short, if a goal is not scored right away, give the penalty kick.

In no case, however, is the advantage signal to be given for an offense inside the penalty area. The time is too short for you to divert your attention from the critical decision to be made. You are still applying the advantage concept but the terms of the advantage decision change and having to give a signal could detract from the accurate application of that decision.'

If the offense involves violence you stop play right away and deal with it to avoid further violence.

The procedure you followed is NOT what USSF teaches us and you are a USSF referee. You decided to give advantage instead of immediately calling the handling and awarding a penalty kick. Also, you rightly bring up the possibility of a caution or send off. Advantage realized inside the penalty area is considered by the Federation to be a goal, NOT a good clean shot. Once the shot was missed, you should come back to the original foul, award a penalty kick, and you still may consider a caution or send off

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

See Question: 21960