True, but even then, touching the ball with one's hands, or being touched by the ball, even if done deliberately, does not necessarily rise to the level of the foul of deliberate handling for which the referee need stop play and restart with a DFK. The hands must do something with the ball beyond making contact such as play, parry, pick-up, propel, punch, pass, push, possess.... This is a hard one, I know, particularly when the players realize their mistake and look so darn guilty, but you do not need to stop play when such doubftul or trifling offenses occur. Learning to control our instincts to blow that whistle in such instances is how we transit from officiating gotcahball and learn to become soccer referees. Noone said is was going to be easy. Sherman
Correct. That is because the player is not protecting him/herself. The ball is moving past them and they reach out. If you believe that the player didn't do it on purpose then play advantage or issue a DFK. If you believe that it was done on purpose to obstruct the opposing team then a card is in order. Crowdie
Experiment: 1. get a tennis ball or other similar object. 2. Walk down a street until you encounter a stranger whose hands are free. 3. When you are about six feet from said stranger, gently toss the ball toward him. He will instinctively catch the ball. Did the stranger intentionally catch the ball? Not really, since you tossed it so quickly and unexpectedly that he didn't have time to formulate an intent. He simply caught the ball because that's what his reflexes told him to do. That is my point. It isn't easy to judge intent, so over the years, referees have all pretty much agreed upon certain definitions of intent.
OK.. I totally disagree with this line of thinking. Why you ask? We did this exact experiment in London one idle Thursday. People don't catch because of instinct. They do it by choice. Those that recognise it was a tennis ball caught it. Those who did not got out of the way. Yes, they avoided contact. It is the avoidance which is the instinct. But I agree. Intent is very hard to judge. Hence the reason a 3rd non-biased party was brought into the game. If intent was easy to judge there would be no referees.
How about: Experiment: 1. Get a rotten tomatoe 2. Walk down a street until you encounter a stranger whose hands are free. 3. When you are about six feet from said stranger, gently toss the rotten tomatoe toward him. He will instinctively move out of the way, and depending on his disposition display some amount of agression towards you.
And if you hurl it quickly he wil raise an arm to ward off the impending ketchup. I do agree the tomatoe is likely not the only red you will see. LOL ) Remember on a soccer pitch the ball is a normal part of the enviroment and the players to a greater degree KNOW they are not to TRY and handle it. My opinion is that in the majority of cases they do not deliberately try. The spin of the ball, the speed of the ball, the fear or protective instinct, and lack of technical skill, all factor into the ball hitting the hand. I guess in guaging a deliberate handling foul the criteria of careless = deliberately handled but accidentally, reckless = intentionally handled to break up attacking play excessive = DOGSO that ball just ain't going there are applicable after all.
Your levels of foul/caution/send-off are correct. You just can't use those labels. Careless/reckless/excessive doesn't apply to handling the ball. (Nor does it apply to holding, spitting, or making contact with the player prior to the ball when tackling.) For example, if you were writing a report of a caution, you wouldn't say the player recklessly handled the ball. You'd say the player was cautioned for unsporting behavio(u)r for handling the ball and breaking up an attack. I'd avoid using the word "accidentally" in conjunction with "deliberately". It makes sense in the context of the portions of your post that I didn't quote. But accidentally more often would mean inadvertantly - which of course is not a foul.
I'm a latecomer to this discussion and since a) the details have been thoroughly examined and b) jc508 is my personal referee model and it would feel odd to me to try and improve on his answer, I would only add this: The problem here is not making the call. The problem in situations like this is selling the call. Call nothing, as is certainly justifiable, and you may as well head directly over to the opposing coach and send him off right then rather than listen to him have an attack of the heebie-jeebies for five minutes and THEN send him off. Conversely, trying to construct a case for "intent", OGSO or not, is equally going to seem unfair to the offending team. And intent is what we're all struggling with here. These are the ones that justify the high pay and perks we all enjoy. (Sarcasm) While it's always wrong to make calls based on the players', crowd or coaches' anticipated response, so equally, I think, it's important to pull off tough ones like this without needing a police escort to the parking lot. Just pray they occur in a regular season blowout rather than in the waning moments of the second overtime of a Championship.
As a paying member of BigSoccer, Mr. Archer has a right to a signature line. I suggest you PM or e-mail him if you have an issue with his sig. All issues relevant to politics belong in that forum not here. Also no baiting is tolerated.
just trying to be funny True Gary iit is a valid point, it was tounge in cheek but I suppose it could be misleading I just thought it funny as a comparision.
Interesting. I made the comment as I was advised by another moderator that comments about the Iraqi situation were not welcome here. Are you advising that they are? In terms of baiting the baiting is being done by Mr Archer's signature line. If I had a signature line as a premium member that incited Americans about the Iraqi situation how long would it be tolerated? Crowdie
I'm not sure how a signature that appears in every post of a member has anything to do with the thread that member replies to. It's one thing to have a sig, it's quite another to deliberately bring up politics as a reply to the thread itself. Anyway, can we keep the discussion on-topic here? I find it interesting and would hate for it to die off now.
Thanks everyone for your feedback. It has been very interesting. Bill hits here on the real problem that I ran into. This was a competitive regular season match with lots of pushing/holding and whining going on. I was quickly getting into a position where I felt the game spiraling out of my control. The team that handled the ball in this case was leading by 1 goal with about 15 minutes to play. The potential DOGSO definitely would have impacted the result. One thing to remember from my original post was that based on my positioning, I could not tell definitively if the ball would have hit the girl's face or body or would have sailed over her shoulder into the goal (or into a keeper's waiting arms, for that matter). (Un)luckily, things turned from bad to worse for me when the attacking team decided to take the PK while I was still clearing folks from the box and before I whistled the restart. In fact, she never spotted the ball on the 12 yard spot, she just kicked it from where I had laid it down for her to pick it up to spot herself (about 15 yards back) She missed the shot but I made her retake it because I had not started play back. Of course, she scored on the properly taken PK. This resulted in most everybody forgetting about the PK call and focusing all their ire on me for allowing her to retake the kick. It took two yellows for dissent and a long explanation to the defense's coach to get this game back under control. All I could I think about in the next few minutes was how glad I was that I had kept the red card in my pocket earlier so as not to give them further reason to hold me in contempt.
handball Not wise enough to have calculated this myself, but it has held up in observation since I heard it. If we never again call a hand ball when the ball and the hand meet, we'd be right 85% of the time (NOT recommended as the approach). The trick is determining if the contact is part of the 15% that is a foul.