Question Number: 27318

Law 5 - The Referee 4/15/2013

RE: Youth Travel Under 16

Chuck of Howell, NJ USA asks...

Team was up by too many goals as per league rules. Team that was winning passes ball back to keeper, who proceeds to pick the ball up and throw it into his own net.

What's the correct call?

Answer provided by Referee Joe McHugh

Hi Chuck
The correct decision is to play advantage if it was a deliberate kick by a team mate , award a goal and restart with a kick off.
The referee should not intervene in the playing of the game other than to enforce the Laws of the Game. If he so wishes could report the matter in his match report.

Answer provided by Referee Gary Voshol

This is one reason I don't like artificial 'too many goals' rules. I know the intent - to not make the losing team feel any worse than they already do by making it a blowout. But it so often doesn't happen that way. The team that's leading scores an own goal as in this situation, so they can keep playing. (And as Ref McHugh notes, the referee should invoke advantage and allow the goal - there's hardly anything more advantageous than the ball in the net.) Or they yell out to each other, 'We can't score any more goals!' I'm sure that gives the opponents a warm fuzzy feeling.

Instead of hard limits, coaches should be taught how to deal with potential blowouts without making a spectacle of it. They might play X number of touches by different players. Shoot only with the off-foot, or only outside the 18. Practice passing back and re-establishing the attack - because sometimes you might need to know how to do that. Or target getting the ball to the player who seldom scores a goal, maybe hasn't had one all year.

That said, I see that this question is titled U16 Travel. At that age and level of play, we shouldn't need means of holding down the score. If a team is suffering a blowout, perhaps they should be playing in a lower league.

Answer provided by Referee Keith Contarino

The correct answer is to play advantage but it's likely that the referee would blow the whistle before the keeper threw the ball into the net because he may not have realized what the keeper intended to do