Question Number: 26713

Law 11 - Offside 9/3/2012

RE: Competitive Under 19

Harris of Someplace, Somewhere Canada asks...

As an AR in a U18 Boys game, I dealt with a particular offside decision scenario.

The ball is kicked forward by a player to his teammate who is in an offside position (just a step off) fulfilling all the conditions but active play. I continued to chase play as the assistant referee across the line since the player wasn't quite yet in active play yet. Five seconds later, the player is about to play the ball so I slowed down and raised the flag.

The defenders look over to me and appeal to the referee after seeing my raised flag but the attacker continued on and scored. The referee had a clear angle of my raised flag as soon as I raised it but ignored it.

After the goal was scored, there was uproar from the defending team because of my raised flag that wasn't taken into consideration by the referee. The referee then came over to me, likely to quell complaints and not for the additional information since it looked like he had already made up his mind. Before I could advise him, he told me that the player was in an onside position or approximately level (from his angle) and he then returned to the middle awarding the goal.

In this scenario, the player in question was indeed in an offside position, despite the marginality, but my question pertains to how I should interact or should have interacted with the referee to work cohesively and provide the right decision. I was unable to tell the referee that it was a tight decision and that the player was in an offside position when it happened because he simply didn't accept any feedback from me.

Do you have any recommendations? The goal strongly affected the outcome of the entire game so it was a game-changing decision.

Answer provided by Referee Joe McHugh

Hi Harris
As a referee I always accept the AR's offside flag unless he has made an error such as missing a play by the defending side, missed a touch by the attacking side or that an onside player has come into to play the ball instead of the offside player. That is what I tell the ARs in the pre match discussion.
Ultimately the call is for the referee to make yet he does not have the side on view that an assistant has, to take into account all the players and their positions.
In this situation you acted correctly by keeping your flag up until seen by the CR. He then came across, you gave him the information which he decided was incorrect and restarted with a kick off. If asked by any of the defending team I would direct their inquiry to the referee.
I would also be raising this decision in the post match discussion with the CR and expressing my disappointment that my good view of the offside was ignored in favour of his view. What can happen here is that 5 seconds is a long time in play and with position changed dramatically in the that time, the original offside position can only be determined by the AR.

Answer provided by Referee Michelle Maloney

Defenders who stop playing because the flag goes up will have goals scored on them, as you observed.

The referee is the final arbiter of any decision to stop play, including whether or not an offside has occurred. All you can do is provide information to the referee. If he or she does not accept it, you have done your job and the referee must live with the decision.

Address the issue post game, and ask the referee if it appeared you were not positioned correctly, and reiterate that you were in line with the second to last defender, and had an excellent view. Perhaps the referee thought you raised the flag too early, since the player in question had not actually played the ball, although if there was no other attacker nearby, that would not have been necessary.

Answer provided by Referee Keith Contarino

I've worked as an AR with referees like this but never more than once. If you were correctly positioned, you were the only person capable of making a correct call. I had a referee in a tournament I worked many years ago start making his own offside calls towards the end of the first half. At halftime I asked him why and he said because the parents were yelling at him about my non-calls. I asked him if he was seriously going to make calls based on parents opinions, not his ARs? I never worked with him again.

As a referee I have always told my ARs in pregame if they are in proper position, I will almost never overrule them. I have enough to do without worrying about offside. It's a shame this referee wasted your talent but it's on him not you. You just continue to stay positioned and make the correct call. Once the referee tells you to lower the flag, don't argue but talk with him at the half or after the game.