The Reinvention of the Offside Law

[Rightdm00]

• gaining an advantage by playing the ball or interfering with an opponent when it has:
• rebounded or been deflected off the goalpost, crossbar or an opponent
• been deliberately saved by any opponent
• A player in an offside position receiving the ball from an opponent who deliberately plays the ball, including by deliberate handball, is not considered to have gained an advantage, unless it was a deliberate save by any opponent. 

A ‘save’ is when a player stops, or attempts to stop, a ball which is going into or very close to the goal with any part of the body except the hands/arms (unless the goalkeeper within the penalty area).

Schar has deflected the ball. No one would call what Schar did a pass. Under the offside rule a deflection is not considered a delibrate play. Also, based on the definition of a save in this law you could argue what Schar did was a save and a save doesn't reset an offside player. 

[Muriel]

I know it is stupid but a touch like Schärs have been judged as an attempted play of the ball for many years now. 

It does not make sense to keep bringing up the rules and interprate them in different ways. There is a set standard for how these rules are interpreted. Referees don't just get the rules books handed to them and are then asked to understand them. They receive instructions on how to interpret them as well, and they have been told that in situations like yesterday, there can't be offside.

It is like that all over the world by the way so all this criticism of british referees is quite stupid. We have these exact same discussions on a yearly basis in Denmark as well. The fact that no lines were drawn in the VAR room should be enough to tell people, that was what happened yesterday. 

[Five Ken McNaughts]

2 hours ago, blandy said:

That's a good question.

Yes, I would. He had at least one option - to leave the ball (obviously):

His deliberate attempt (he knew) would carry the risk of an O.G. but also to give the keeper a chance to come out and catch it, or for the ball to go for a corner.

Leaving it ran the risk of it going to Watkins in space in the box, because his team mates were nowhere to be seen, or maybe the keep might have dived forward and collected or punched it or kicked it away.

So he had 2 options. Maybe more. And in terms of time, the cross was from the wing, he was somewhere around the near post, from memory, maybe corner of the 6 yard box - so he had time to consider what to do.

Others might see it differently, but it is consistent with what's been judged in other games.

I don't like this "clarification", but at least it's being applied the same for all teams. The Mings one (a rarer occurrence) is consistently flagged as offside (until mid-week) and the Ref and Lino effed up, then the PGMOL went into damage denial mode. 

 

Well, I naturally respect your opinion, but I don’t see how sliding full length to desperately try and intercept a cross can be looked upon as having “time and options”. Not going by the common meaning and usage of that term in the context of a football match.

[blandy]

3 minutes ago, Five Ken McNaughts said:

Well, I naturally respect your opinion, but I don’t see how sliding full length to desperately try and intercept a cross can be looked upon as having “time and options”. Not going by the common meaning and usage of that term in the context of a football match.

Likewise. I guess none of us know what the criteria the officials use actually are. It'd be nice to know. TBH I partly based my answer on the fact/impression that officials seem to view those kinds of instances as within the definition, based on the last couple of seasons or so, so to answer that "no he didn't have time or options" would go against the evidence of my own eyes. Like I said, I can see others might see it differently, and I've no issue with that -  we're just discussing something that's done and dusted, so what we think is neither here nor there.

[darrenm]

1 hour ago, TheStagMan said:

EVERY GOAL IS CHECKED BY VAR. EVERY GOAL. 

it was checked (they even said it at the time on the Sky commentary). VAR and lines being drawn only come about if there is doubt. 

One look clearly shows Ollie to be onside (due to the position of the ball, not the attacker). No need for the VAR guy to get his slide rule out and the game can carry on.

The pundits are just showing themselves up to be the idiots they are.

Perhaps we're disagreeing over what checked means.

I didn't say they didn't check every goal. I said they didn't draw the lines. There's a difference between checking by saying 'yep I didn't see anything from here' and actually getting the lines out which takes a few minutes each time. If you think the VAR did 'check' the goal by drawing lines but we just didn't get to see then how quick do you think they did it? It took about 20 seconds to be confirmed as OK.

[Rightdm00]

Fulham Burnley FA cup match same thing just happened (18th minute) and it was correctly ruled offside. Burnley player cut out a cross from a Fulham attacker, deflection took the ball to an offside Fulham player and he was correctly adjuged to be offside. 

[Muriel]

You can't be serious? Those situations are not even remotely close to being the same? The Burnley defender gets the ball kicked onto him from about 2 meters away, and does not in any way attempt to play the ball.

[AlwaysAVFC]

2 hours ago, TheStagMan said:

The pundits are just showing themselves up to be the idiots they are.

Yeah to be honest I was purely going on what the commentators said. Which could quite easily be their own false interpretation of what happens on a VAR check.

I don't know what information they are given but clearly are given some info from VAR after a check. The commentators said that because of the touch Watkins position wasn't checked as it wasn't necessary. Whether that's their interpretation of what happened or what they were actually told I don't know.

My interpretation from that was yes there was a VAR check to check for offside. They decided there was a deliberate attempt at the ball and didn't need to check anything else as it want off side. So yes there was a check for offside like there should be, it doesn't mean they checked where Watkins was.

Anyway I don't care, it's a goal, we won.

 

Edited January 24, 2021 by AlwaysAVFC

[VillaChris]

Anyone see the third Tammy goal?

Way ahead of last defender but he was behind ball when it was cutback so no issue whatsoever of it being chalked off.

[kidlewis]

1 hour ago, Rightdm00 said:

• gaining an advantage by playing the ball or interfering with an opponent when it has:
• rebounded or been deflected off the goalpost, crossbar or an opponent
• been deliberately saved by any opponent
• A player in an offside position receiving the ball from an opponent who deliberately plays the ball, including by deliberate handball, is not considered to have gained an advantage, unless it was a deliberate save by any opponent. 

A ‘save’ is when a player stops, or attempts to stop, a ball which is going into or very close to the goal with any part of the body except the hands/arms (unless the goalkeeper within the penalty area).

Schar has deflected the ball. No one would call what Schar did a pass. Under the offside rule a deflection is not considered a delibrate play. Also, based on the definition of a save in this law you could argue what Schar did was a save and a save doesn't reset an offside player. 

This is what I thought. 
 

if Watkins wasn’t behind the ball when played I’d have said that’s offside as it deflected off his shin. 
 

but the referees have opened a can of worms with the city goal vs us. I hope it causes carnage for loads of sides now. 
 

hope Liverpool score one similar vs United and City get screwed over and lose a game because of it. 

[Rightdm00]

21 minutes ago, Muriel said:

You can't be serious? Those situations are not even remotely close to being the same? The Burnley defender gets the ball kicked onto him from about 2 meters away, and does not in any way attempt to play the ball.

You see the level of silliness if you try to use the interpretation of Schar "deliberately" playing the ball. To my eye the Burnley player reached to cut out the cross. That's a delibrate play. 

Of course it's garbage just like saying a slide tackle from a defender is a delibrate play. You can't go there it completely changes the game. 

[tom_avfc]

29 minutes ago, Rightdm00 said:

You see the level of silliness if you try to use the interpretation of Schar "deliberately" playing the ball. To my eye the Burnley player reached to cut out the cross. That's a delibrate play. 

Of course it's garbage just like saying a slide tackle from a defender is a delibrate play. You can't go there it completely changes the game. 

Of course the defender is trying to block the cross in both instances. I don’t see how you can argue that one of those is a deliberate play but the other isn’t. It’s ridiculous that there’s even a debate. When the original pass is played the player is offside. That should be the only consideration with those type of goals as it always has been.

[Muriel]

I'm not disagreeing with you on the rule being silly. I am just saying that in terms of law and how it has been interpreted and implemented those two situations are not in any way similar. 

[Spoony]

It sounds like to get to an accurate decision with the current rules the refs all have to sit down after a goal and sift through 2 pages of law and have an 11 page debate on a forum before they can make a call. The law really needs to be simplified 

[a-k]

8 hours ago, Vive_La_Villa said:

What’s PL productions?

It's the main stream for worldwide audiences

[a-k]

Double post..

Edited January 24, 2021 by a-k

[StefanAVFC]

The 2-0 win against Everton came up in my recommended on YT, so I thought I'd give it a watch.

1:35 in, Mings blocks the ball, Richarlison stood offside, then challenges him from the offside position, after the touch, and it's given as offside and not any fuss is made.

 

There must have been so many of these happening every week without any comment, yet now it's the new rule and I imagine that, that wouldn't be offside.

@tom_avfc @kidlewis @Five Ken McNaughts

[tom_avfc]

29 minutes ago, StefanAVFC said:

The 2-0 win against Everton came up in my recommended on YT, so I thought I'd give it a watch.

1:35 in, Mings blocks the ball, Richarlison stood offside, then challenges him from the offside position, after the touch, and it's given as offside and not any fuss is made.

 

There must have been so many of these happening every week without any comment, yet now it's the new rule and I imagine that, that wouldn't be offside.

@tom_avfc @kidlewis @Five Ken McNaughts

The people who are looking for loopholes in the rule have the easy get out that this is a "save" as its stopping the ball from going in. 

I can't be bothered to do the research but I'd imagine there's quite a few examples of exactly what happened in both the Newcastle game and the Man City game where these have been called offside for years. The fact that any comparable decisions have brought about the same uproar from fans suggests that they're never the right decisions in the first place.

I get more fed up with the pundits saying how the rule is mental and it shouldn't be offside. The rule is fine its just if you seek to interpret it in a completely crazy way then you're going to get crazy results. I'd suggest that looking for loopholes to support silly decisions isn't a good road to go down. Its almost impossible for the laws of football to cover every possible "loophole" situation that could occur.

The laws have always stated that referees should use their common sense and judgement in applying them. I think the real issue is that we now seem to have a pretty bad crop of referees who between them don't appear to have any common sense whatsoever. The general standard of refereeing in this country is at an all time low in my years of watching football and while people are happy to lap up any mental explanation put out for bad decisions then we'll continue to get dreadful decisions. Its one of a number of reasons that watching football is a pretty frustrating experience frequently.

[darrenm]

Shocker

 

[StefanAVFC]