Question Number: 22899

Law 13 - Free Kicks 3/4/2010

RE: Competitive Adult

Jeff of Concord, CA USA asks...

This question is a follow up to question 22839

I have struggled with keeping the restarts in my head as well. I have come up with the following to help me with the restart.

I) There are three types of entities
A) Involved in the game
1) Players
a) teammates
b) opponents
2) Referee team
a) referee
b) assistant referees
c) fourth official
B) Previously or Potentially Involved in the game
1) Substituted player
2) Substitute player
3) By the decision of the referee, a player leaving the field of play to commit an offense
c) Not Involved in the game
1) Anyone or anything else
2) Players, when they are not on the field of play

II) A game is
A) a ball that is in play
B) within the boundary lines that make up the field of play
C) by players, both teammates and opponents (Involved in the game)
D) under the control of a referee team (Involved in the game).
E) All other entities and places are considered outside of the game.

If you accept the above definitions, then you only have to determine if the offense is within the confines of the game or not and what type of entity was involved. The question of in the confines of the game or not tells you where the restart is, and what type of entity is involved tells you the type of restart.

When a game is stopped for any foul or misconduct that ONLY involves the game, as defined above, the correct place of restart is from where the offense occurred. The correct restart type is a free kick.

When a game is stopped for misconduct or other interference outside of the game, as defined above, the correct place of restart is from where the ball was when the game was stopped...
...If the misconduct 'relates' to Previously or Potentially Involved players, the restart type is a free kick.
...If the interference 'relates' to an entity Not Involved in the game, then the restart type is a dropped ball.
'relates' means that the offense was committed by an Involved player against that entity or that the entity committed the offense.

When an offense occurs when the ball is out of play, the restart is appropriate to the reason the ball was out of play.

Type of free kick...
...If the offense involves a foul, the free kick is either a penalty kick or direct free kick.
...All other free kicks are indirect and subject to the special circumstances listed in law 8.

Examples (please forgive the violence):
A) Player hits teammate on field during play. Within game. Involved entities. Does not meet definition of foul. Restart is IFK where offense occurred.

B) Sub comes onto field and hits referee during play. Outside of game. Previously or Potentially Involved player. IFK where ball was.

C) Sub comes onto field and player hits sub. Outside of game. Previously or Potentially Involved player. IFK where ball was.

D) Coach comes onto field and player hits coach. Outside of game. Not Involved entity. Dropped ball where ball was.

E) Player leaves field to hit coach during play. Outside of game. Not Involved entity. Dropped ball where ball was.

F) Volleyball hits soccer ball during play. Outside of game. Not Involved entity. Dropped ball where ball was.

G) Player hits opponent at half time. Ball out of play. Kickoff.

H) Player hits AR off the field. Referee decides player left field for purpose other than to hit AR. Outside of game. Not Involved player. Dropped ball where ball was.

Does anyone see a flaw in this logic?

Answer provided by Referee Michelle Maloney

I suppose the labels you attach are fine if they work for you. My concern with your logic is you use terms that have different meanings outside of your definitions. For instance, a game is not just what happens on the field while the ball is in play. A game includes the whole experience - from warm-ups to final exit from the field. Game reports cover the whole game, not just the time the ball is in play.

If what you wrote works for you and helps you keep it straight, that's great. I find it to be rather cumbersome. I don't need all those extra definitions to know that if the ball is out of play, the restart follows the reason it left the field - except in some circumstances. For instance, an extra player is discovered on the attacking team after a goal but before kickoff - clearly we can't have a kickoff .

Neither do I need all of those definitions to figure out what to do with misconduct by substitute or subbed player, or to deal with an outside agent. Law 8 is pretty clear that I can use a dropped ball anytime there isn't another prescribed restart if I had to stop play for something. It will be an IDFK if it isn't one of the ten DFK/PK fouls for which play was stopped, and if it left the field and thus stopped play, my choices are TI, CK, GK, KO - unless something causes it to not be one of those after all.

Three types of entities? There are three teams out there, granted. But the categories are redundant. A player is either a teammate or an opponent, but he is not a substitute player. We can have substituted players, which really only has meaning in the games played under limited substitution rules, which in the vast majority of youth and recreational adult play means there are only players and subs.

Perhaps you meant there are three types of status? One is either an active participant (player or opponent), a referee team member, or someone not directly involved in play on the field. This last category includes substitutes, substituted players, coaches, team personnel and anyone else in the vicinity - but the restarts depend on something else besides the status.

I wish you good luck - that's a lot of extra material to carry around in your brain, in addition to all of the information we are expected to know about the Laws and their application.

Answer provided by Referee Dennis Wickham

I think you've made a good beginning, but your terms can get in the way of increasing your skill.

Law 12 tells us that some fouls are indirect free kick fouls.
From Law 3, we learn that some acts are a dropped ball or an IFK depending on more than one factor: who does it and where they do it.

The USSF Advice to Referees has some useful restart charts, and you may find them helpful.