Question Number: 23142

Law 5 - The Referee 4/19/2010

RE: Adult

C N Fused of Cambridge , MA USA asks...

This question is a follow up to question 10999

We saw a professional womens soccer game yesterday (Boston Breakers vs. Philadelphia Independence) and a PK was awarded to the Breakers. The ball was set up for the kick, the kicker was ready, the referee appeared to be in a proper position to supervise the PK and then suddenly everything changed. The referee blew his whistle, took away the PK from the Breakers and awarded a goal kick. It was very strange, as if the Breakers had been initially awarded the PK for what was a clear foul in the box, and then had it taken away for some infraction. Question: can a referee take away a PK once awarded?

Answer provided by Referee Michelle Maloney

Many times a referee will call an offense, indicate a direction, and somewhere between making the initial call and the restart, the referee realizes they made the wrong call. When this occurs (hopefully not often), the referee must stop the restart, announce the change in decision and allow the teams to set up for the new restart before blowing the whistle to begin play. The referee can change the restart as long as he has realized his mistake before the restart has taken place. Sometimes he has realized the mistake and is trying to get the whistle to his mouth to announce the decision and the kick is taken anyway. In that circumstance, the referee should still call it back because the decision to change it was made but not announced before the restart happened.

This can happen when the referee belatedly realizes the AR had information he needed before making the call, right after half time, and sometimes just because.

The mechanics are odd, and one can only speculate at the reasons why the referee would make a change at that stage, but he has every right, and in fact a duty, to do so if in his opinion an error was made on the initial call. It takes a lot of courage and conviction to follow through when you know you've made a mistake - too many referees would just let it go.

Answer provided by Referee Joe McHugh

Hi
The simple answer to this is that as play had not restarted the referee can change any decision that he/she makes.
On the face of it this seems an odd decision but if the ref was approached by an AR who informed the referee of something that he/she did not see then the referee should and can act on that.
Penalty calls are big decisions in the game and the referee should not make that call lightly. It is also a very big decision to award a penalty, set it up and then change the decision to a GK?
I've never seen that but I have seen referees change their mind on an award of a PK on the advice of an assistant but that happens instantly without the PK being set up.
What the referee did was correct in law and entitled to do it but the mechanics leave a lot to be desired. We have all changed our mind on the direction of a TI or a corner kick but not on a penalty.

Answer provided by Referee Dennis Wickham

The referee decided to accept the flag from the assistant referee that Lilly was offside before she was fouled. The video seems to confirm she was offside when she received the pass.

Although the mechanics looked odd, the key is that the referee team made the right decision before play restarted.