Questionable football rules

[The Master]

8 hours ago, HibeeJibee said:

Aye, but you get my point, in principle there's nothing stopping them running the left-hand sides and the ref the reverse diagonal...

No, and it used to happen albeit very rarely.

I suspect it's now essentially extinct because that's the setup the current generation of referees were trained with, so they've stuck with it.

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or the same side and the ref go parallel in front of the other.

But there is something stopping this - the lack of clear visibility of the entire pitch. It would also give the assistants a far bigger say in matches than they currently do because you'd effectively be asking them to referee one side of the pitch, and the actual referee the other.

The diagonal setup means the referee takes on the majority of the officiating, only requiring assistance as and when required.

[craigkillie]

10 hours ago, HibeeJibee said:

Here's a point - why do linesman operate only on the right-hand half of the pitch? No reason they couldn't officiate on the left-hand half, surely.

Indeed they could both operate down one side.

If they both operated down one side there'd be nobody to tell if the ball was out for a throw-in.

[Diamonds are Forever]

On 27/02/2019 at 11:33, ScottishZizou said:

That no-one really knows what constitutes a handball is very amusing, e.g the World cup Final. I remember hearing an American who didn't know much about football not being able to get their head round the penalty (which he said was basically like giving a goal) for a handball that the person couldn't really do anything about. I think the rule should be changed to an indirect freekick if non deliberate but arm in unnatural position and direct freekick/penalty if deliberate. It's a tricky situation and a definite grey area.

 

If I interpret your post correctly, I think you can add yourself to the list of people who don't understand the handball law. You are aware that any handball has to be deliberate to be a foul?

[Diamonds are Forever]

I've always found strange the lack of time the ball actually spends in play, yet total stoppage time across both halves rarely adds up to more than 5-6 minutes. The average time the ball is in play is around 55 minutes. So in total around 30 minutes of a game 'disappears'.

There should be a clock like Ice Hockey or Basketball where when the ball goes dead or the whistle is blown the clock stops. You'd get 90 minutes of play and it would remove any of the ambiguity of the stoppage time issues. You'd also get a 50% increase in goals/talking points/entertainment.

[craigkillie]

Those are natural breaks in the game - stoppage time is supposed to be for actual stoppages above that (timewasting, injuries, substitutions etc).

[parsforlife]

Goal kicks, it should be taken from the side the ball went out on unless it’s over the bar. Then it should be taken from the side the keeper comes back onto the pitch from. So easy to fix?
 

This used to be a rule i think? (Minus the 'over the bar' scenario). It was completely pointless.

I think your aiming this based on late in game time-wasting, but this wouldn't fix it much.

[PB1994]

 
If I interpret your post correctly, I think you can add yourself to the list of people who don't understand the handball law. You are aware that any handball has to be deliberate to be a foul?

Not for long. They are taking the word deliberate out of the law soon.

[Todd_is_God]

20 hours ago, Donathan said:

Not that anyone realised this existed until this weekend, but the fact that there is no obligation for a substituted player to actually leave the field

I did know that tbf.

A substitute cannot come on and immediately take a throw in. Something i'm fairly certain happened with Dikamoma during the Hearts game...

[Salvo Montalbano]

On away goals, I'm sure it was in an old rule book that "in the event of a draw on aggregate, then goals scored away from home shall count double" in such the same way that penalty shoot outs are still called "kicks from the penalty mark"? Was back in the old Fairs Cup etc. days when I guess two legged games were perhaps a novelty?

On the linesmen (Assistant Referees, of course) running on one side only - this happened famously at Highbury in an England v Soviet Union game (I think the referee was Russian and the linesmen were English) where there was fog. The English players and press weren't impressed as they felt the Russian ref was letting things go on the far side of the pitch and it was also difficult to see when the ball was out. On the different sides thing, I think the English Football League used to have it's linesmen run on the opposite sides to almost every other league (including the English Premiership) until fairly recently.

On actually questionable laws, I'm not a fan of the various incarnations of the offside law that have been used over the years but in particular this notion of "phases" that came in not too long ago. How you can be offside and disrupting a defence yet because something happens before you get the ball it's OK just seems a bit wrong. There's also the "six second rule" for goalkeepers that came in, was strictly enforced for a season or two then was seemingly binned (although I'm sure I read somewhere it was still actually in the law book?) - not sure what actually happened there.

[Christophe]

13 hours ago, Todd_is_God said:

I did know that tbf.

A substitute cannot come on and immediately take a throw in. Something i'm fairly certain happened with Dikamoma during the Hearts game...

Did not know this. I saw this happen at St Johnstone vs Rangers U18’s just yesterday. I thought it odd as the throw was on the other side of the park from the dugouts so the player trotted all the way over to take it, but didn’t realise it wasn’t allowed, and obviously neither did the officials! What is the aim of the law here? 

[parsforlife]

Did not know this. I saw this happen at St Johnstone vs Rangers U18’s just yesterday. I thought it odd as the throw was on the other side of the park from the dugouts so the player trotted all the way over to take it, but didn’t realise it wasn’t allowed, and obviously neither did the officials! What is the aim of the law here? 

Very quick google found this...

"Of course a substitute once he becomes a player can take any restart including a throw in. The only difference is that the substitute must first step on to the field of play and then leave again to complete the substitution process thus becoming a player. Once that is done he then take the TI as a player. He just can't go down the line to the point of the TI.
It has nothing by the way to do with the whistle sounding to restart play.
The reason behind this process is that if any misconduct happened off the field of play involving the substitute the team can argue that they did not plan to use him and that they should not play short. Once he steps onto the FOP that all changes. "

http://www.asktheref.com/Soccer%20Rules/Question/26316/

Which does make sense.

Based on the explanation your scenario is fine.

[The Master]

15 hours ago, Salvo Montalbano said:

On away goals, I'm sure it was in an old rule book that "in the event of a draw on aggregate, then goals scored away from home shall count double" in such the same way that penalty shoot outs are still called "kicks from the penalty mark"? Was back in the old Fairs Cup etc. days when I guess two legged games were perhaps a novelty?

On the linesmen (Assistant Referees, of course) running on one side only - this happened famously at Highbury in an England v Soviet Union game (I think the referee was Russian and the linesmen were English) where there was fog. The English players and press weren't impressed as they felt the Russian ref was letting things go on the far side of the pitch and it was also difficult to see when the ball was out. On the different sides thing, I think the English Football League used to have it's linesmen run on the opposite sides to almost every other league (including the English Premiership) until fairly recently.

On actually questionable laws, I'm not a fan of the various incarnations of the offside law that have been used over the years but in particular this notion of "phases" that came in not too long ago. How you can be offside and disrupting a defence yet because something happens before you get the ball it's OK just seems a bit wrong. There's also the "six second rule" for goalkeepers that came in, was strictly enforced for a season or two then was seemingly binned (although I'm sure I read somewhere it was still actually in the law book?) - not sure what actually happened there.

I thought the six second rule had been changed to “reasonable time” years ago. 

But a few weeks ago I was checking the rules after the Conor Hazard incident in the East Fife v Partick Thistle Cup tie* and sure enough it’s still there. It surely can’t have been enforced in a long time. 

 

*Keeper kicked a back pass, which then got caught in the wind and it came back at him. He caught it and (rightly) had an indirect free kick awarded against him. 

[tarapoa]

Infantino and Collina among others are in the Marcliffe in Aberdeen today looking to change a few rules of fitba.

Will send a copy of this thread in there.

[HibeeJibee]

On ‎26‎/‎02‎/‎2019 at 23:19, HibeeJibee said:

Also a personal bug bear... goalkeepers controlling the ball outside the box, dribbling it inside and picking it up. Like in rugby where you can't retreat into your own 22 and kick for touch, this should be banned.

During the Bonnyrigg v East Stirlingshire cup QF today the 'Shire goalie charged out of his box, back-headed the ball behind him then ran back and caught it.

I'll have to tighten up my wording.

[Mark Connolly]

On 3/1/2019 at 19:10, craigkillie said:

Those are natural breaks in the game - stoppage time is supposed to be for actual stoppages above that (timewasting, injuries, substitutions etc).

That's fair enough, but why don't they stop the stadium clock/tv clock/whatever to give a more accurate representation like they do in other sports?

[Donathan]

11 minutes ago, Mark Connolly said:

That's fair enough, but why don't they stop the stadium clock/tv clock/whatever to give a more accurate representation like they do in other sports?

 

FIFA have (still are?) actually looked into the possibility of what you suggest, only difference being you wouldn't play a full 90 minutes of "live" play otherwise the actual game would the best part of three hours to complete.

 

I think the suggestion was to have an "in play" clock but shorten the game to two 30 minute halves. That would give you roughly the same amount of gameplay as we have today, matches would still last under 2 hours and time wasting would be eliminated.

[Mark Connolly]

3 minutes ago, Donathan said:

 

FIFA have (still are?) actually looked into the possibility of what you suggest, only difference being you wouldn't play a full 90 minutes of "live" play otherwise the actual game would the best part of three hours to complete.

 

I think the suggestion was to have an "in play" clock but shorten the game to two 30 minute halves. That would give you roughly the same amount of gameplay as we have today, matches would still last under 2 hours and time wasting would be eliminated.

You don't even need that. Other sports survive quite easily with 1/4 to 1/3 of the game having the ball out of play.

The referee just needs to signal that time is stopped/restarted for the various clock operators to keep up.

[Donathan]

1 minute ago, Mark Connolly said:

You don't even need that. Other sports survive quite easily with 1/4 to 1/3 of the game having the ball out of play.

The referee just needs to signal that time is stopped/restarted for the various clock operators to keep up.

 

My point is, if we want to go down this route then the length of a game can't continue to be 90 minutes.

[Mark Connolly]

1 minute ago, Donathan said:

 

My point is, if we want to go down this route then the length of a game can't continue to be 90 minutes.

Why is that your point?

I'm not advocating the clock being stopped every time the ball goes out, just that it becomes clearer when the ref has stopped and restarted time under the current conditions, as happens in sports like rugby and hockey.

[Bairnardo]

Why is that your point?
I'm not advocating the clock being stopped every time the ball goes out, just that it becomes clearer when the ref has stopped and restarted time under the current conditions, as happens in sports like rugby and hockey.

A visible stoppage time counter, perhaps then? Rather than stopping the clock as such.