Question Number: 21079

Law 12 - Fouls and Misconduct 4/2/2009

RE: Rec. Adult

Grant of Mandeville, La. St. Tammany asks...

I was playing defense in the box, when an offensive player turned to pass the ball to an outside player, kicked the ball right at me. I instinctively covered my abdomen and the ball struck the back of my hand. The other team (we have no ref's in the old folks league) quickly called a hand ball and took a pk.
Should that have been a pk?

Answer provided by Referee Michelle Maloney

Did you deliberately handle the ball? If not, then no, there was no offense and no PK should have been given.

General rule of thumb:
Hand to ball = offense
Ball to hand = no offense

Sounds like yours was ball to hand - no offense. A referee, if one is on the game, would be the fact finder here. With no referee, you are at each others mercies.

Answer provided by Referee Steve Montanino

Hire some refs, let them decide, this is why we have refs anyway!

Refs are objective, your opponents aren't.

Answer provided by Referee Richard Dawson

Ball hit into the midsection, hand on belly, ball hits back of hand resting on belly. In my opinion unless you backhanded the ball away it is unlikely there was a dfk foul of handles the ball deliberately so thus no pk just because it was inside the area. If you made no attempt to play that ball or tried to make yourselg bigger a Neutral referee might have decided that way in your favour? Even in Fun leagues the laws apply but given the perception of the opposition players they will rarely see what the referee sees, more what the players feel!
Cheers

Answer provided by Referee Chuck Fleischer

There are quite a number of inexperienced referees [and experienced ones at that] who have trained players anytime the ball hits a hand play should stop for 'handball'. What they don't understand is the offence really is reads something like this: handles the ball deliberately [except for the goalkeeper within his own penalty area].

You can and I can tell the difference between the two, right? Too bad there are referees out there training players incorrectly. You've been bitten by an ineffective referee even though no referee was present.... Aw S@%^, if you get my drift.

Regards,