Question Number: 34343

Law 12 - Fouls and Misconduct 9/20/2021

RE: Competitive High School

Jason Cole of Lacrosse , WI United States asks...

Regarding this Joao Felix incident -https://youtu.be/bn3lkxSN-zQ about 3 minutes in - would it have been better to give the foul for the pullback, and then also a card to Felix for the strike? Have you ever done anything like that? Any part of thus you think the ref got wrong?

Answer provided by Referee Richard Dawson

not going to argue the referee decision he made in real time from a few feet away. His match his decision his reputation. I can speculate that perhaps a more proactive officiating might have created a different outcome? A verbal, hey I see the sailboat pull out might have changed the reaction? I am unsure if the referee was awarding a foul for the retaliation as a DFK strike instead of a DFK holding which should be the restart? I saw a freeze frame image on the jersey tug which looked like the pulling actually tugged the right shoulder around causing the free arm to flap as opposed to a deliberate elbow into his face? That is conjecture, but I sense the carded player really felt hard done by and not without cause. That dude is NOT a dirty player, I think that was his first send-off ever? Dissenting the call, it must have been very intense to get double yellow! Admittedly after watching that front view which the referee did not have, I do wonder if he got it wrong? Armchair officiating never works well lol
Cheers

Answer provided by Referee Joe McHugh

Hi Jason
In this part of the world UEFA has been clamping down on the use of arms in challenges. Many of these challenges where there is contact to the head with an arm are being sanctioned with a yellow card. Aerial challenges with an arm used for leverage which makes contact with the opponents head are being dealt with also by a caution.

I believe that UEFA has decided to try to protect players from getting head injuries through the use of reckless use of arms even those that are accidental.

In this case there is no doubt that Joao Felix makes contact with a flailing arm to the head of his opponent. The correct decision there for me was a caution for the pull back of Felix and also a caution for the arm flail. Joao Felix obviously did not like the decision to get cautioned and it is clear that he turned around and said something to the referee with a gesture pointing at him and then to his head. That is dissent which is a caution.
I believe that the only error made here by the referee is that he failed to caution the player who caused the issue with the pull back. He should have issued that caution first as the initiator should be sanctioned first. The fouled against player can see that sanction has been taken and then told that an arm to head is also a caution and to be more careful. It should have been a caution for the pull back whatever about the timing and perhaps with all that went on afterwards with AM players challenging the decision plus the manager that the referee forgot to caution for the foul?

As to the sending off a player cannot really have any grounds for complaint when he gets a caution and then berates the referee with a gesture and words. Sometimes referees let that type of dissent behaviour slide and chose not to issue the 2nd caution like in this case. I would suspect that at this level players have been advised that raised arms into the head of a opponent will be a minimum of a caution.

For me personally I always made a point of trying to defuse situations by talking to players and perhaps involving captains. I don't ever recall immediate dissent that needed a 2nd immediate caution and I always made a point of ensuring equity in cards in that in this example here both would have got a card in the *proper* sequence of initiator first followed by the head contact caution. If there was the start of a moan by the fouled player he would get an explanation that he cannot arm flail into an opponent’s head and not get a sanction.