Question Number: 32246

Kicks From The Penalty mark 2/19/2018

RE: Competitive Adult

Ahmad of San Francisco , California USA asks...

Hello,
We played a game that was tied 2-2
A penalty shootout took place. The opposing team took their 5 shots and scored 3 goals. Our team took 4 shots and scored 3 goals. The ref missed the fact that our team had to take the 5th shot and declared us winners. Both teams and others were watching and no one caught this until a day later when video footage was seen

What do the laws say here?

Thank you so much.
Ahmad

Answer provided by Referee Joe McHugh

Hi Ahmad
Not sure what you mean here? One team took 5 penalty kicks and scored 3 while the other team took 4 shots and scored 3. What happened to the 5th kick? If a goal was scored from that kick then the result is 3 - 4 with one team winning? If it was missed or not taken then kicks continue with sudden death until there is a winner.
My experience is that in addition to the referee keeping score the players and team officials are also doing the same. It would be exceptional to have a result with both team scoring the same number of goals and it not being picked up by the losing team.
If it were to happen the laws make no provision for it. It is a matter of a protest by the losing team and the competition organisers making a decision on the appeal and the referees report. There are time limits and fees to be paid in lodging any protest.

Answer provided by Referee Richard Dawson

Hi Ahmad,
a referee has ended the match, albeit incorrectly and sends in the score with the match report. The circumstances for a protest (Usually a time deadline and cost factor to set it in motion) or in correcting an illegal result is generally a replay of the match assuming time and fields can be made available.
In tournament play generally once it ends there are no options available unless it is a provincial or state or a national league organization.

There is an obvious error in the count by the referee if you both were tied with 3 goals apiece after the 5th shot by your opposition but you had yet to shoot a fifth shot to equal the opportunities. He can not legally declare you the winner as you have yet to score & win or miss thus still tied and THEN you go to sudden death ??? IT appears he was either mixed up in the order or did not record the scores correctly ? The first 5 shots are not sudden death so it is the total that counts. If KFTPM go into sudden death it becomes a tit for tat opportunity, who ever misses and the other makes only then is the result determined.

I once coached a high school girls team that had a similar occurrence in KFTPM when we were tied after the first 5 shots, we each missed our 6th into sudden death mode, the opposition scored on their 7th and he declared them the winner but we were shooting 2nd and had yet to shoot our 7th shot. The referee was a complete dunderhead in not grasping that sudden death was tit for tat not who scored 1st. I talked it over with the other coach who seemed to grasp the significance but the referee was the type of to not be approachable so he sauntered off blithely unaware of the situation he created by not understanding the LOTG correctly.
Cheers

Answer provided by Referee Peter Grove

Hi Ahmad,
The laws say that the kicks should go on until either one team has scored more goals than the other could score from its first five kicks, or if the scores are still level after that, until one team has scored a goal more than the other from the same number of kicks.

So if your description is accurate, the referee has made a mistake. One team has not scored more that the other, the teams were tied and so the kicks should have continued.

I can't understand the part where you say no-one noticed until looking at a video the following day. Surely someone on the teams or among the coaches or spectators must have been aware that the scores were level?

In any event, the game has not reached a proper conclusion. The laws do not cover this as they assume the referee will follow the proper procedure. The rules of competition however, usually allow for the result of a game to be protested (this would normally only be done by the losing team). One of the situations where the result as reported by the referee can be overturned is when the referee has made a technical error, which is (apparently) what happened here.

Assuming the protest is upheld, the competition organisers will decide what action to take, based on their rules but I imagine that in this case they would most likely rule that the kicks from the penalty mark should resume from where they were when the referee called the game, and continue until a proper result is obtained. At least, that would be my vote if I were on the panel considering such a protest and the video evidence showed what you say it does.