Question Number: 16851

League Specific 9/23/2007

RE: rec Under 10

sarah of valley center, ca usa asks...

Recently our girls team won a game 14 to 0. And believe it or not our coach was not trying to run up the score. Is there a there a high score cut off at which to call the game, or what should we have done?

Answer provided by Referee Steve Montanino

What a silly statement. How can a coach of a team NOT try to run up the score and still win 14-0. I wonder if that coach has any control over his under 10 team then.

There is no official high score cut off, though I suppose some leagues in the USA may have a "mercy" rule, you'd have to check with those competitions.

Answer provided by Referee Michelle Maloney

I assume the coach was able to give all players on the team time on the field, and give everyone a chance to play other positions? If so, that's all he can reasonably be expected to do. My son's coach once upon a time would call for subs and take out three and put in two, so the other team was playing 11 on 10. He wanted his kids to practice having to adjust to being a man or two down, but because of the way he did it, no one ever noticed what he did. It was a sporting gesture within the spirit of the game, his team knew if it happened what they needed to do, and was good for his team as well. Sometimes these things just happen. The other team will have to figure out what and why and see if they can fix it.

Answer provided by Referee Chuck Fleischer

Congrats, but why?

Answer provided by Referee Gary Voshol

I've seen many lopsided scores in my time, but it's a very rare game where the coach had no options to prevent it. Yes, I can recall thinking a few times that a team played fairly and with respect for their opponents, despite the high score. But not very often.

Hopefully this score will be attributed to ignorance on the part of the coach, as it was one time in one of the few games I coached. I was listed on the roster, but generally only provided administrative support to the head coach. On this particular day, I was the only responsible adult there. We had only 12 players, so I could hardly keep all the "good" players on the sideline and play only the scrubs. We made up our mind that we would pass the ball around a lot, and attempt to feed it to players who had not scored all season. A pretty good strategy usually, but in this case the other team couldn't even defend against Charlie when all the other kids were telling each other, "Pass it to Charlie." We had a pretty good midfielder, one who might be playing premier except for the monetary and time commitments which his family couldn't or wouldn't swing. I ended up not playing him for a long while at the end of the game, and we had a pretty good chat on the sideline as we watched the team still dominate. I found out later that it could have been acceptable for me to pull a player or two, and practice playing outnumbered in case we were ever short.

The opposite thing happened in a game about 2 weeks ago. The coach got to our rec league's 8-goal limit, and then continually shouted at his guys, "Don't score" whenever they took the ball down into the other end.

Which tactic is better, attempting to spread the wealth of goals, or letting the other team know that you could score but are directing the kids not to?

The key to making changes is to do it in a manner that does not humiliate the other team even worse than a lopisided score would do. And, to implement the changes early enough in the game so that you can still play attacking soccer, perhaps with some restrictions on how or who may score. For example, if you find yourself ahead 3-0 in the first 12 minutes, start taking action then. If you do go on to score another few goals, at least it won't be 14-0.

A few cycles back, the Australian national team beat an opponent 31-0 in World Cup qualifying. Part of that was due to the team they beat, one of the island nations. But another part was the way the Oceania tournament was set up, where goal differential was a big factor determining who advanced. If a league pits unequal teams in competition, and then awards big goal differences, they will have to expect some score run-ups. Even if it is youth and not the Nats.

Note that none of this is a referee issue. There is nothing the referee can do to prohibit a team from scoring. Players and coaches cannot be cautioned for unsporting behavior simply because the team scores goals.