I think you're conflating things here. It can simultaneously be true that "daylight" was part of formal instruction and that international level ARs just weren't always that good back then. If anything, in that era the ones who could regularly get stuff right without obvious mistakes stood out precisely because they were so good. Getting very close stuff wrong was almost the default, despite whatever the instruction was. Translating theory to practice is always hard. Regardless, I genuinely can't remember if it was something taught from IFAB/FIFA on down or if it was more short-hand "this is how you should be assessing things." I also can't remember the exact era that we're talking about because there have been so many different tweaks with Law 11 applications over the years. But I am pretty confident that "you should see daylight to punish offside position" was formally taught--let's say sometime this century. It appears @coreyrock has followed this thread a bit, so if he remembers details there might not be a better source to set things straight.
That's fair. I have no idea and I'm completely speculating, but I don't think there was formal training or instruction per se at tournaments or pre-season seminars of "only call offside if there is daylight." I think what you said of "this is how you should be assessing things" is closer to reality than any actual formal instruction or practice. What it might have been is more along the lines of ARs and instructors saying to each other as more of a rule of thumb. I just don't think there was every any formal instruction to look for daylight. Similar to what is kind of told on in and out penalty decision (i.e. if the attacker is outside the penalty area, but lands inside the penalty area more likely than not the foul is outside and vice versa If the attacker was inside the penalty area, but lands outside the penalty area the foul, more likely than not was inside).
This "daylight" teaching might have been as recently as the late 90's. I'm sure we have USSF officials here who despite lacking FIFA credentials in their career, have been doing this for quite a while, can indicate if this was some "guidance", the exact instruction (meaning you're not looking for a leg, shoulder or head to judge offside) or if it's bunk. I don't believe it's a myth.
While I can't prove a negative, I initially certified shortly after the Great Rewrite I, and the law update seemingly every year was a set of tweaks to Law 11. I would have been developing and upgrading through the aughts, so while I didn't get FIFA training, I did attend basically every training I was aware of, and attended a bunch of the "national" tournaments with high level trainers and training. Lots of stuff about keep the flag down until you're certain and a late, correct flag is better than an early, incorrect flag and encourage attacking soccer. How to compensate for flash-lag. The whole shebang. I don't ever recall anything about daylight. Just "body parts that can legally play the ball". That said, given some of the messaging, I can totally imagine that some state associations may have translate the messaging I got into "make sure they're really, really off before you flag it. Like a whole body off".
This sounds more like the teachings during the year (2008?) after the famous Landon Donovan play where almost every recertification in the country went over the play where the AR is lifting his flag way too early (by today's standards) and assuming that the offside player was going to touch the ball, but Donovan out runs him (he was onside at the kick-point) and touched it instead for a breakaway. Almost half of the class was dedicated on the clarifications/revisions to offside that year. This "daylight" stuff would have been at least 10 years or so before.
before the game starts I just wanted to post this funny photo of marciniak from yesterday indicating the foul was outside the box.
To be fair, if he uses his right hand for his whistle it's really hard to make that signal. Plus, he's not talking to anyone or engaging an individual directly. So I've got no problem here, in this particular case when he's using an informal mechanic to explain something globablly right after whistling. But to the larger problem, yeah, so many "elite" referees keep their whistle in their mouth when cautioning or otherwise engaging players and it drives me crazy. There was a time when that was beaten out of you as you moved up. Now it seems like people stopped caring.
I noticed that too, I was always told that unless you’re actively blowing your whistle, keep it out. I figured it was just something that they don’t care too much about anymore.
Absolutely needs to be a rule change, penalty kick pinball is just boring, nobody wants games decided that way
they say that they do not need defenders playing with their arms hidden behind their back, but I suspect that is really what they want.
Would have been one of the all time VAR moments if it ended up as the winning goal. (And I'm assuming it will be supported by UEFA as a clearly correct intervention.)
Ridiculous decision (which I realize may be correct by CL standards). Thankfully, it didn't impact the match. PSG were deserved winners without it.
I was hesitant to bring this one up because of my team allegiance but that was just mind-blowing I have to ask - when it comes to VAR reviewing handball, is there anything like a trifling and doubtful breach of the law? I think the answer is pretty clearly no and globally I think that's the worst effect of VAR on the game: we've lost the concept of "trifling and doubtful". That is such a huge part of how games were played and officiated for over a century but now it's pretty much gone and I don't see how we get it back.
"doubtful" is certainly there in the sense that an offense has too be C&O. But I don't think trifling is part of HB in the modern game, at least at the VAR level. (I also think in practical terms it is a lot harder to apply in a VAR context than it is on the field by the R.)
I might be totally wrong about this, because this is just from memory, but the daylight guidance may have been in there when we were judging offside by the torso versus head/foot/etc. Therefore, if there wasn't "daylight" in between the torso of the attacker and torso of the defender, this should be considered "even" and we should keep the flag down.
Man, am I going to be on an island here... It clearly hits his hand. It's a dangerous shooting opportunity. His arm is extended away from his body, far outside a normal silhouette. It's his hand--not like a debatable portion of arm v armpit or anything like that. Leaving aside current rules/instructions or the various permutations we've gone through in the last 10+ years... what standard do people want to draft or create where this isn't a handball? I get the feeling people don't like this because no one noticed it in real time (and maybe some partisanship... and maybe some influence from the commentator's reaction). I'm sorry, but I can't think of a way to legislate handball where you don't punish a ball hitting a fist/palm extended away from the body on a shot on goal where it is directly struck and there is no intervening deflection or ricochet. Having not watched the game live, I expected to see something much different when I read the thread first and then went to look at the highlights just now. Other than the fact that no one really noticed and the intervention took a bit... this seems like an obvious handball penalty that has been a handball penalty since the dawn of time if seen properly. Maybe that's it. Because this was never or very rarely seen properly in the pre-VAR days, we want to give it a pass now?
As usual, mass is the voice of reason. I can’t believe people here are advocating that this is a ridiculous handball to give. The guys hand is sticking out, the shot goes towards goal, and it hits his hand. How is this not a handball? How are the commentators (at least on the RTE Ireland copy I was watching) saying how “harsh” this is? Because the ball didn’t completely stop when it is hit his hand and continued on its path?
This tracks with my jogged memory now, for what it's worth. The torso days feel like when this was taught and I would imagine it came down from pretty high up.
I think the reason this wasn't seen properly in the pre-VAR days is that it the ball appears to hit the tips of the fingers without clearly changing direction or speed. This is where I was going with the "trifling" comment earlier. For me, the only way I could clearly see that it struck his hand was the spray from the rain flying off his fingers. And to your question, I mean, yes? Going down the VAR path (which we definitely are) gets us into seeing things that really don't seem significant, at least in the spirit in which many people here were instructed. Maybe our understanding of the "spirit of the game" needs to change? I suppose that's possible but it's hard because most people learn to play (and referee) one way and it's only when they get to the very top level of the professional and international game that things change. Now, I'm pretty sure this will be judged as a correct intervention by UEFA but it just seems more disconnected from what a lot of people understand the game to be.
This is it. If it hits the palm of his hand and drops down to the defenders feet then there are very few (if any) complaints. I agree with Massref that this is absolutely a foul but psychologically it just hits people different when it is finger tips vs forearm/hand.
His arm is sticking out 90 degrees from his body, and it’s within the frame of the goal on the shot. How does the game “understand” that this should just be ignored? And BTW the CBS highlights I got this from the commentator is complaining how “Lewis skelly isn’t even looking at the ball” so you can call this a handball since he’s not looking at it. Lol