Question Number: 33312

Law 12 - Fouls and Misconduct 5/5/2019

RE: REC High School

Mary Ramirez-de-Arellano of DAMASCUS, MD United States asks...

The ball was being contested in the penalty area. The keeper was forward of the end line trying to get the ball standing among a group of defenders and offenders. Meanwhile her teammate moved back to the goal line to protect the ball from entering the goal. The ball came to this teammate who immediately passed it forward to her keeper (now up field from her.) The keeper caught it. Is this an instance of the passback a keeper is not supposed to handle? I didn't call anything because I had never seen this. No one challenged my non call. Was this legal?

Answer provided by Referee Richard Dawson

Hi Mary,
the direction of the pass is NOT important! What is important is YOUR opinion what was the intent of that deliberate kick? Was it to get the ball into the keeper's hands or was it simply a clearance the keeper intercepted?

Given no one gave it a thought I suspect it was seen in this light.

Under the LOTG you COULD see it as an infraction IF you could clearly decide the intent of that deliberate kick was an obvious a pass to her keeper via a deliberate kick.
However, in a goal mouth scramble a loose ball jumped or sized upon by the keeper is likely to be thought of as her just doing due diligence in response to her duties as keeper. This is one of the very few fouls where we look at the INTENT of a deliberate kick by a team mate's foot to the keeper's hands but why did it do so? Deliberately saving a goal was the reason for the deliberate kick this created a rebound and being fortunate the keeper was there to grab the rebound seems ok to me!
Cheers

Answer provided by Referee Peter Grove

Hi Mary,
If you believed that this was a ball deliberately kicked to the goalkeeper by a team mate then yes, you should have called it.

The law does not say anything about the direction the ball travels. The term 'back pass' is in fact a total misnomer and one of the reasons I (and others) dislike it, is precisely because it can so easily be misleading and cause misinterpretations of what the law actually means.

Answer provided by Referee Joe McHugh

Hi Mary
The use of the misnomer *backpass* suggests that the kick must be towards goal. That is not the case. The kick can be in any direction and as long as it is a deliberate kick to the goalkeeper or to a place for her by a team mate that is all that matters. So yes the kick can be forward so if you believed the kick was TO the goalkeeper then that was an offence. If on the other hand it was a clearance that happened to be caught by the goalkeeper then no offence.
As to the non call I always remind referees to ask *Whose game is it?* If the attacking team is non plussed about no offence and it looks like just part of regular play then the *best* decision can be to ignore.
In a game I might see a *parry* of the ball by a goalkeeper which goes unnoticed by the opponents. I will just let it slide as a call that does not need to be made.
In your example I would have dive the exact same based on the non call for an offence. It can be doubtful, trifling and in this instance the GK had 6 seconds to release the ball back into okay.