Question Number: 33739

Law 12 - Fouls and Misconduct 10/28/2019

RE: Adult

Roy Agyei of Burgess Hill , West Sussex United Kingdom asks...

When a player is defending at a corner, and does not face the ball once it has been played and blocks the opposing player by pushing with both hands in his chest, is it a foul and is the punishment a penalty awarded against the offending defender?

Answer provided by Referee Peter Grove

Hi Roy,
Pushing an opponent can most certainly be an offence, but it is one of those actions that must be done in a careless or reckless manner, or with use of excessive force, before it's penalised. Whether any particular instance of pushing does actually meet those criteria, is up to the referee's best judgement. As referee McHugh points out, there are varying levels of physical contact allowed and tolerated at different levels of the game, with the pro level setting a relatively high bar in this regard.

I would agree with my colleague ref McHugh that either one of the push by Milivojevic or the leg contact by Chambers could have been called as a foul but more importantly for me, in the context of a VAR review, not giving either of them was not a clear and obvious enough error by the referee to justify being overturned as required by the VAR Protocol.

Answer provided by Referee Joe McHugh

Hi Roy
If I had a pound for every time I heard *In the back ref* I could retire with a tidy sum of money. So not all contact is a foul and Referee a Grove has spelt out the requirements
Now I wonder if you were looking at the Arsenal v Crystal Palace game in the lead up to the disallowed goal by Sokratis?
The Crystal Palace #4 defender Milivojevic is seen using both hands on the chest of his Arsenal opponent Chambers in the build up the foul that ruled out the goal.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=CaXB3W7-E5I
The incident involving Milivojevic is a perfect example of your scenario of two hands in the chest *push* yet no foul was awarded which would have resulted in a penalty kick.
Now we know that the Pro game has allowed a greater deal of physical contact in set plays such as corner kicks etc. Chambers seemed indifferent to the contact which may have swayed the referee and VAR not to call that offence or perhaps the only incident under investigation by VAR was the leg contact between both players after the *push*
Personally I think that the push could have been called as it was as much a foul as the reason the goal was disallowed.
As described by yourself a push with both hands into the chest of an opponent is punished by a direct free kick or penalty kick.

The following questions were asked as a follow up to the above question...

See Question: 33742