Question Number: 24530

Law 12 - Fouls and Misconduct 1/25/2011

RE: rec Adult

alex of richmond hill, ontario canada asks...

This question is a follow up to question 24515

Interesting answers that prompt for more questions or clarifications.

1. If the restart has taken place, then the ref cannot go back and change his decision.

2. If a referee was alerted by his AR about incident the ref did not see, then the ref can go with a different restart and course of action based on the AR information. And it does not matter how many restarts had occurred.

Now it seems to me that there is an overlapping area between item 1 and 2. What should the ref do if, after allowing a restart on a stoppage, saw the AR flag and stopped play? Stick with the original restart or choose a different action appropriate to the AR inputs on something that happened on the original stoppage?

Answer provided by Referee Dennis Wickham

Your point number one is the general rule. It is subject to an exception that the Zidane sendoff during a world cup final made famous.

If the AR sees an act of misconduct (USSF interpretation, other federations might limit to violent conduct), and the AR raises and continues to maintain the flag, the referee may caution or sendoff as appropriate if the referee accepts the AR's information even though play has stopped and restarted in the interim.

The new restart, however, will not be based on the original act of misconduct. It will be for the reason play had been stopped (or a dropped ball if the referee stopped play only because of the flag).

The referee may choose not to act on the assistant's information. The referee has many tools to deal with cautionable conduct, and the nature and circumstances of the match, the act and how much time has lapsed might lead the referee not to use a card. IMO, however, a referee who ignores violent conduct is in grave peril of having a match turn into a brawl.

Answer provided by Referee Joe McHugh

Hi Alex
In general if play has restarted then the referee cannot change his decision unless it is for unseen violent conduct that is brought to his attention by an AR or 4th Official. Referees should always be alert to ARs signals and ARs should not allow play to restart without attracting the referees attention.
My advice is that is if there has been a restart such as throw in and play is stopped immediately to deal with the raised flag then play should be brought back to the reason for the flag ie ball out of play, unseen foul etc. If play has continued for a period or a number of restarts and it is not a 'significant' decision in the context of the game such as an offside where the ball has been cleared upfield the AR should lower the flag and allow play to continue.

The following questions were asked as a follow up to the above question...

See Question: 24586