Question Number: 31747

Law 14 - The Penalty kick 8/31/2017

RE: Sel Adult

Dmitry of New Westminster, British Columbia Canada asks...

Ok. my soccer friends. New book came out for Soccer Laws of the game. Does this make any sense or I am missing something?
if both the goalkeeper and kicker commit an offence at the same time:
if the kick is missed or saved, the kick is retaken and both players cautioned
if the kick is scored, the goal is disallowed, the kicker is cautioned and play restarts with an indirect free kick to the defending team.
my concern is: once the kick is taken and saved, both goalie and attacker commit an offence, they get a yellow each. We retake and they do same thing again, they get reds now and we get a new kicker and the new goalie?
concern 2: is it fair for the kicker to score a goal and have it disallowed, get a yellow, minding that both committed the offence? On the other hand if it is saved or missed, it is a retake. Logically, does not make sense to me. I mean if they both committed offence and goal is scored- allow the goal. And if it is missed - it is missed.

Answer provided by Referee Joe McHugh

Hi Dmitry
Thanks for the question.
IFAB it seems wants to clamp down on offences at penalty kicks such as illegal feinting and blatant encroachment.
If a player gets a caution then it is incumbent on the player not to get another caution otherwise the player gets dismissed. So a repeat offence at a penalty kick can result in a sending off for two cautions.
In respect of your second point IFAB clearly want to differentiate between more serious offences and perhaps the first cause of the sequence. If the kicker and goalkeeper both infringes the laws and no goal is scored then it is a retake and a caution for both. Now if the goal is scored then obviously the kicker has clearly benefitted from his illegal action rather than the GK hence the different sanction and restart.
While the thinking might be fine on paper in reality it is likely to be more difficult to implement with perhaps only blatant infringements now being called.
Have a look at this video which is somewhat dated due to the restart is now changed.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=mzll_fvaqCg
The goalkeeper may have moved off the line before the kick yet it is the more serious offence of illegal feinting that was punished, that is the offence that caused the issue. Under the new Laws the restart is now an IDFK rather than a retake. As it was the kickers second caution he was dismissed and the referee had no choice in the matter.

Answer provided by Referee Peter Grove

Hi Dmitry,
As to your first 'concern' - yes, if both players commit two cautionable offences they would both be sent off. So having been cautioned already, both players would need to be very careful on the retake, to avoid being dismissed.

On concern 2, the logic behind it, according to the explanation of the change given by the IFAB in the 'Details of all Law Changes' section is as follows:

''Clarifies the outcome when both the goalkeeper and kicker offend at the same time, which is rare as usually one will have clearly been the first to offend.
There are different outcomes because:
• if the kick is missed/saved (because of the goalkeeper's offence) both players have committed a cautionable (YC) offence
• if a goal is scored the goalkeeper has not committed a cautionable (YC) offence but as the kicker's offence is cautionable (YC) it is 'more serious' (see Law 5) and is therefore penalised.''

Please note that, as the IFAB mentions, this would be a rare offence - as they say, offences are almost never truly simultaneous, so this is a situation that would almost never arise but one that the IFAB felt it had to make provision for, just in case.

Answer provided by Referee Richard Dawson

HI Dimitry,
this black hole event would be once in a lifetime if htat!
I agree with you it would be a silly situation for both participants to engage in an idiotic action that could conceivable get then both cautioned twice and ejected reducing their teams by a player forcing a possible substitute for the keeper or player if there are still substitute options otherwise a player already on the field would take over the keeper duties. It also depends if the match is ongoing or this was KFTPM to decide the outcome whether the player could be subbed?

While my colleague points out illegal feinting as a USB action is more serous than the keeper off the line I hold that it was LIKELY the feigning that drew the keeper off the line? Seems surprising to me unless the keeper was clearly off his line before the feigning started to think it is worthy of punishment at all? As the ball is not in play until it is kicked the actions of the kicker and the keeper are both ONLY misconduct they are NOT a foul thus the restate remains the same

Still if the retake for the miss is the only logical restart for the dual actions of misconduct and if a goal is scored it is an INDFK out it assumes the keepers action did not affect the outcome only the kickers USB thus the change from retake to indfk out

It is sort of like trying to explain offside we can explain it TO you but we can not understand it FOR you as it is difficult notion to wrap your head around all the rational that goes into deciding any possible restart. Some are simple others are well... NOT!

Cheers