Question Number: 21139

Law 8 - Start and Restart of Play 4/17/2009

RE: Division 1 Adult

Jesus Olide of Ceres, California USA asks...

Last weekend I was doing a match as center referee on the 20th minute of the first half on a loose ball at the touch line player 'A' and player 'B' from opposite teams challenging the ball ran out of the field while the ball was still on the field player 'A' commited a foul on player 'B' outside the field of play. I call the foul on player 'A' when I realized that the ball was inside the field I didn't know what to do, so I re-started the play with a drop ball. My question is if that was the right call? Thanks for your help.

Answer provided by Referee Michelle Maloney

Fouls can only happen on the field, while the ball is in play, between opponents. Here, you only had two of the three (ball in play & oppoents), so it was not a foul. Maybe misconduct against A, but no foul.

Dropped ball is a good call here. Unless player A left the field to commit the misconduct or bad deed or whatever it is he did off the field, if you stop play to deal with it, the restart is a dropped ball, even if you issue a caution or sending off.

If player A left the field to commit the offense, whatever it was, and it was misconduct in your opinion, the restart is an IDFK where the ball was located when the incident off the field happened.

As the decider of facts, it is up to you to determine if the players leaving the field was in the normal course of play, and only when off the field did A get in trouble - or did A leave the field with the clear intention of doing whatever it was he did to B? Your decision, your reputation.

Answer provided by Referee Richard Dawson

If the event occurs 100% OUTSIDE the field of play into the area we call TOUCH, even though the ball is IN PLAY, it cannot be classified as a foul only MISCONDUCT. The drop ball is the designated restart for this event IF The referee DETERMINES the player who creates the misconduct was off the field accidentally as part of the normal playing conditions.

While players can wind up into touch by overrunning the ball or perhaps avoiding a fallen player it is difficult for me to think a pursuit of the ball is not tactically relevant in that foul or misconduct is ALWAYS a possibility if the one or the other is beaten

If a player accidentally crosses one of the boundary lines of the field of
play, he is ***not*** deemed to have committed an infringement. Going off the field of play ***may** be considered to be part of a playing movement.
In my opinion the word **MAY** implies an OPINION by the referee yet it also says **NOT** an infringement

Great controversy has arisen because under recent law changes it was stated that one COULD classify a player who LEAVES The field without permission to create misconduct as an INDFK restart. This is a CAUTIONABLE action unto itself. The secondary misconduct off the field could be another cautionable action or even classified as VC thus a straight red card shown with a send off reduce the team by a player. The issue of a declaring the leaving without permission and the secondary act of a trip hold etc as ONLY a single cautioning event even if we nullify the advantage principle has us scratching our heads if this is doable?

b. Offences off the field of play
1. By players
The IFAB has set up two approaches to the situation involving a player committing an offence while off the field. If the player has left the field in the normal course of play and, while off the field, commits an offence -- after dealing with the misconduct, play is restarted with a dropped ball where the ball was when play was stopped* (misconduct committed by a player off the field). However, if the referee decides that the player left the field for the purpose of committing the offence, the restart (after showing the appropriate card) is to restart with an indirect free kick where the ball was when play was stopped *.

It is a lousy loophole that SHOULD not be allowed but current laws make this no brainer a confusing mess at times. I might try to stretch the advantage if we can get the foul back onto the field. I also have issues with ANY challenge for the ball as in the culprit chasing the attacker off the field intending to deny him the ball rather than haphazardly sliding out by accident. I want to use the INDFK restart which is for leaving the field to commit misconduct but then I have to declare the misconduct only as a careless variety if I wish to not double caution or see it as VC!

The relative *wisdom* and I use that term loosely of FIFA/IFAB to declare players off the field of play are to be considered ON the boundary line where they left when considering offside makes me wonder why a restart could not occur from this point or at the ball position?

I suspect FIFA /IFAB is loath to correct the off the field misconduct as occurring on the touch line or goal line because if the area is bounded by the lines that encompass them imagine the guess estimate of an off the field encounter near a meeting of the boundary lines as to which restart to go with pk or dfk or indfk. Imagine a PIADM off the field that prevents an attacker from going around to score?
Cheers

Answer provided by Referee Keith Contarino

Here we go again!! First, the player committed misconduct off the field of play. Fouls can only be committed ON the field. You have decided that the 2 players went off the field of play during the normal course of play. You have decided that player A did NOT go off the field of play to commit misconduct. Given that is your decision, you must restart with a dropped ball where the ball was when you stopped play. This entire mess has been created by IFAB. If you decide the culprit went off the field to commit misconduct, you restart with an IDFK because the player left the field of play without permission, and that's what the caution is for, not the actual incident that happened off the field of play. So, if you are cautioning for leaving the field of play it only seems logical that you also have to issue a second caution for whatever the player did off the field of play you considered to be misconduct in the first place. If you don't, then you have to view the offense as trifling. If you do that, why did you stop play for a trifling offense? I don't see any logical way to avoid 2 cautions if you follow the guidelines we have been given and caution for leaving without permission. All this could be avoided if IFAB went one way or the other. Either every action off the field of play deemed misconduct results in a dropped ball restart or every incident results in an IDFK restart and the caution in either case is for the actual action that precipitated all this in the first place, NOT for leaving without permission.