Question Number: 2752

11/20/2001

RE: Junior Adult

Daniel of Cork, Ireland asks...

I was just reading one of your questions, the one about what would happen if a defender fouled an attacker just off the field of play and thought of an incident I saw happen at a game recently in which an attacker took on a defender in the penalty area got to the bye line, with the defender still in pursuit when the attacker got to the bye line he did a Cruyff turn, the ball went back towards the direction the attacker ran from , then the defender fouled him . However the foul took place slightly off the field of play. The referee gave a free kick outside the penalty area .Surely this is the wrong decision as if the defender did not foul the attacker he would have scored what looked like a certain goal..Could you please clarify this as there is alot of discussion about it?.Thank You..Danny.

Answer provided by Referee stewart 11/22/2001

If a 'foul' is committed off the field of play, then the only options that the referee has is 1. Allow play to continue if the stoppage would be a disadvantage to the 'fouled' team and deal with the misconduct at the next stoppage or 2. Stop play to deal with the misconduct and restart the game with a dropped ball at the point that the ball was when play was stopped. If the referee was of the opinion that he had denied an obvious goal scoring opportunity, then he should order off the offender, but the restart would still be a dropped ball. I'm not sure of the exact position of your scenario, but you cannot take the ball away from the penalty area just because the offence took place off the field.