Question Number: 33233

Law 12 - Fouls and Misconduct 4/10/2019

RE: Competive Under 14

Terri of oakton, va usa asks...

This question is a follow up to question 33222

a player passes back to her defender, but defender was not able to trap the ball and ball travels to the goal keeper (directly behind).
Is this considered a deliberate pass back, if the goal keeper was not the original intended recipient?
If no, then goal keeper should be able to pick up the ball.

Answer provided by Referee Joe McHugh

Hi Terri
As described this is not a deliberate kick to the goalkeeper. However the referee may not see it that way and may opine that the ball was intended for the goalkeeper.
In the US I have seen the implementation of the so called *backpass* law as overly harsh. Case in point is this video
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=7esEwniKXqQ
I believe this strict interpretation is due to the backpass triangle concept as espoused by USSF
The three elements of the triangle idea are
The ball is kicked (played with the foot) by a teammate of the goalkeeper,
This action is deemed to be deliberate rather than a deflection, and
The goalkeeper handles the ball directly (no intervening touch of play of the ball by anyone else)
Based on that a referee can opine that in your example the kick was deliberate and the ball is handled by the goalkeeper hence why these get called.
The Laws of the Game states and I quote
# it has been deliberately kicked to the goalkeeper by a team-mate.
Key word for me in that statement is TO which is why your example should not be called as an offence.
Now the key learning point here for players and goalkeepers is that where these are called ultra strictly that the best decision can be for the goalkeeper to kick the ball away rather than use the hands.

Answer provided by Referee Richard Dawson

HI Terri,

In my opinion, a referee should not look for gotcha or extraneous routes to find non existent infractions. You claim the 2nd out field player receiving the ball from his team mate has misplayed it and via a mistake it has carried through towards the keeper? Play on is the correct decision , even if there was no contact of the ball by the 2nd defender. Keeper use of hands should be permitted! Surprisingly the stewards of the game have asked us to consider the intent of such a pass, not that it simply occurs. This is a bit different when it comes to considering fouls in general where we look solely at the result of an action.

At one time you COULD actually charge the keeper, in his own goal area. Then briefly, there was a time you could even head the ball out of his hands. The laws have adapted from the 4 steps to the current 6 seconds of uncontested possession once a keeper has legal possession of the ball . The whole idea is to encourage continuing play as well as protect the keeper whilst in vulnerable positions holding or reaching to get the ball . The original idea of penalizing the deliberate kick of the ball by a defender to his keeper was because the keeper had the use of his hands to take the ball out of play for a short while, as the opposition CAN NOT play a ball that the keeper had in his hands .

In the past the defender's foot pass & subsequent keeper pickup of the ball and repeat & repeat & repeat was boring and very bad for the game so they made it illegal for a player to use their feet to deliberately get the ball into their keeper's hands thus making the ball more available for the opponents to play it.

Given a defender CAN pass the ball TO his keeper legally with other body parts, the head or chest being the most common, the laws also considered trickery where the foot was used to flip the ball up to get around the idea of the handling restriction. In an actual case of circumvention a referee must caution show a yellow card to the player, apply the INDFK from the position of the player at the time and place of the circumvent, whether or not the keeper did in fact use their hands.

The above situation you described caused me to ask myself, could it qualify as a 'gimmick' to circumvent the laws of the game? If a referee thought that the receiving player was playing a 'dummy' by opening the legs, pretending to play the ball but let it run on to another teammate, in this case the keeper? Could the dummy sell also be circumvention or sound tactical play?

Although one might consider a dummy sell as a form trickery it does not fit the conditions of a circumvention. The indfk for illegal hands must be based on the referees' opinion, was that ball kicked by a teammate, deliberately & directly kicked TO their keeper. The reason it did pop into my head as a remote possibility was if that 2nd defender had stopped the ball using their feet and then subsequently shielded it from an opponent, giving the keeper time to get over and place their hands on that ball THAT is sufficient to qualify it as an INDFK event. Cheers

Answer provided by Referee Peter Grove

Hi Terri,
This is not a ball deliberately kicked by a team mate to their goalkeeper for me, based on your description. To give this as an offence, the referee has to be of the opinion that the player kicking the ball, intended it to go to the goalkeeper. If the referee feels this was a genuine attempt to kick the ball to the other defender, it should not be penalised.

There is a phrase that was used by the IFAB several years ago now, which although it was used in a slightly different context, is (I think) applicable here. The phrase was, ''the referee must only be convinced that this was the player's motive.'' So if the referee here, is not convinced that the original player's motive was to kick the ball to the keeper, they should not consider this as an offence.