Hanging Judge: Continuing with the new law changes for 2021/22

I hope you found the new law changes I set out last week beneficial and insightful. Are you still confused? Sometimes I think I’ll never get my head around them.

It’s important that referees study these new laws carefully and try to arrive at some sort of uniformity to avoid confusion and criticism when the season resumes.

Moving on to the next set:

Law 11 – offside

Amended text

A player in an offside position receiving the ball from an opponent who deliberately plays the ball, including a deliberate handball, is not considered to have gained an advantage, unless it was a deliberate save by an opponent.

The explanation for this is that a deliberate handball by a defender is considered “deliberate play” for offside. A “legal” deliberate play (for example, a kick or header) causes a player in an offside position to no longer be offside. Illegal play should have the same outcome.

Law 12 – fouls and misconduct

This one is quite complicated, so I’m going to try to explain it in simple English, but also quote from the International Football Association Board directive so as not to cause too much confusion.

I covered handball previously. Just to remind you – it is now considered that, halfway down the arm from the shoulder to the elbow is no longer a handball.

The amended text is outlined below.

It is an offence if a player:

• Deliberately touches the ball with their hand/arm, including moving the hand/arm towards the ball;
• Scores in the opponents’ goal directly from their hand/arm, even if accidental, including by the goalkeeper;
• After the ball has touched their or a team-mate’s hand/arm, even if accidental;
• Scores in the opponent’s goal;
• Creates a goal-scoring opportunity; and
• Touches the ball with their hand/arm.

Except for the above offences, it is not an offence if the ball touches a player’s hand/arm.

The clarification says that, “if an attacking player accidentally touches the ball with their hand/arm and the ball then goes to another attacking player and the attacking team immediately scores, this is a handball offence”.

It is not an offence if, after an accidental handball, the ball travels some distance (a pass or a dribble) and/or there are several passes before the goal or goal-scoring opportunity.

Direct free kick – handling the ball

The goalkeeper has the same restrictions on handling the ball as any other player outside the penalty area. If the goalkeeper handles the ball inside their penalty area when not permitted to do so, an indirect free kick is awarded, but there is no disciplinary sanction.

However, if the offence is playing the ball a second time (with or without the hand/arm) after a restart before it touches another player, the goalkeeper must be sanctioned if the offence stops a promising attack or denies an opponent or the opposing team a goal or an obvious goal-scoring opportunity.

Delaying the restart of play to show a card

“If the referee allows a ‘quick’ free kick after a denial of an obvious goal-scoring opportunity offence, the (delayed) red card (RC) becomes a yellow card (YC) so, to be consistent, if the referee allows a ‘quick’ free kick after an offence which interfered with or stopped a promising attack, the (delayed) YC should not be issued.”

Cautionable offences (yc)

Included now is a drop ball; it was not in the past when a player refused to retreat the required distance.

Unsporting behaviour

If a player commits a foul, or any other offence, that interferes or stops a promising attack, except where the referee awards a penalty kick for an offence that was an attempt to play the ball, he shall be cautioned.

The new wording is:

“A promising attack can be stopped or interfered with by an offence which is not a foul challenge [for example, ‘illegally’ playing the ball a second time after a restart], so the wording now includes all such offences other than handball.”

Sadly, I’ve run out of space, so I’ll continue the rest in the next issue.

Stay safe, stay well and keep your distance during this pandemic.

Please feel free to make comments or ask questions.

Happy whistling!

Follow me on Twitter @dr_errol

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