Question Number: 25630

Law 5 - The Referee 10/18/2011

Aaron of Chicago, IL USA asks...

Panel,

A few months ago I took a referee course, and in the course we were given a situation to think about that went roughly like this:
---
Red is attacking the blue goal, when a ball is passed near a red attacker who is in an offside position. The AR raises his flag to indicate an offside offense. However, before the attacker can touch the ball, the blue goalkeeper takes possession of the ball, prompting the referee to decide no offside offense has been committed. As the other players move away from the goal, the goalkeeper, thinking offside has been called, tosses the ball to one of his teammates who caches it with his hands inside of his own penalty area. What should the referee do?
--
Obviously the law is very clear on this matter; the referee never signaled to stop play and the blue player deliberately handled the ball within his own penalty area. However, considering the spirit of the competition, what would you actually do as the referee?

Answer provided by Referee Jason Wright

As the referee I'd do exactly what the laws require; award a penalty kick.

Everybody knows to play the whistle, and if anybody complains on the field that what I'd be reminding them of. It's the whistle that stops play, not the flag.

It's certainly one of those things that you hope never happens, but we do need to be prepared to make the difficult call.

Sometimes we can bend the laws for the spirit of the game, but we can't break them entirely, and that's what you'd be doing if you award anything other than a penalty kick here.

Once you start going against the laws of the game in this fashion, you risk digging a bit of a hole for yourself.

Say you decide to award a drop ball, isntead of a penalty kick. The other team is upset at this (understandably) - then up the other end of the field a defender deliberately grabs the ball, then tries to argue that he thought it was out.

Obviously he's being smart aleck, but how on earth are you going to sell the decision of penalising him? Don't make life too difficult for yourself.

Answer provided by Referee Joe McHugh

Hi Aaron
The scenario is to prompt discussions as to what can happen in a game and the way to handle this. As I have always told referees nothing is always black and white. The correct decision here is a penalty kick as play has not been stopped for an infringement. Young player are told from an early age to play to the whistle.
Now do you think that referees have not awarded an IDFK for offside in this situation? Of course they have because circumstances will encourage the referee to make the 'best' decision for the game.
The scenario also prompts a discussion on mechanics. The referee should IMO shout to the goalkeeper and defenders to continue playing so that there is no doubt that there is no offside infringement.

In the recent N Ireland v Estonia UEFA game an AR erroneously flagged for offside against an Estonian player. The referee saw that the ball was played by a N. Ireland player so it could not be offside so he waved the flag down and allowed play to continue. The N Ireland players saw the flag and most stopped playing which allowed an Estonia player to score. Cue uproar. Now in this case the referee had no choice but to allow play to continue which was the absolute only correct decision open to him. Now contrast that with a situation where there is an offside offence and the referee allows play to continue waving the flag down because the ball has gone back to the GK. The defending team makes the assumption that there is offside, stops play and a player handles the ball. The referee here has a decision to make as to whether he goes back to the original offside offence or does he call the deliberate handling? I have seen these given either way. I believe where the referee crew has added to the confusion with poor mechanics, communication etc that the 'best' decision for the game should be made not just the technically correct one.

Answer provided by Referee Gary Voshol

One way to avoid this situation is to visibly wave down the AR's flag, and shout out, 'Keeper's got the ball, keep playing!'