Question Number: 35831

Law 3 - The Players 12/8/2024

Petr of Prague, Czech Republic Czech Republic asks...

This question is a follow up to question 35830

So that's another problem with the Czech version of the rules.

Believe it or not, they write this there:

A player can intentionally leave the field of play without permission.

when the player:
a) is injured
b) crosses the line in a game action and immediately returns
c)leaves the field of play to avoid being offside
d) leaves the field of play when taking a corner kick, free kick or throw-in
e) leaves the field of play to put the equipment in order

Thanks!

Answer provided by Referee Joe McHugh

Hi Petr
Thanks fir the follow up

The laws allows for B, C and D. B and C are expressly stated in the Laws while D is tacit knowledge as it is not possible to take a throw in or a corner kick without being off the field to do so. It is seen as a playing action.

A and E are not part if the Laws except for an injury while off through momentum. Sure a player could simply walk off and cite A and E to avoid a caution.

As Referee Grove mentions a referee needs to know what is happening in the game. Permission would always be given in A and E yet return would be tightly controlled so that a player could not return into the middle of active play unbeknownst to opponents. That would be patently unfair.

The only true source of the Laws of the Game is the IFAB website. Many former publications have been discarded as as the US ATR as it was not approved by IFAB.

Answer provided by Referee Peter Grove

Hi Petr,
I'm wondering what you mean by "the Czech version of the rules." The IFAB does not allow different national associations to come up with their own versions of the Laws of the Game, and while they have started publishing different language versions of the laws on their website, Czech is not one of them. So I'm wondering who publishes this set of laws and where?

Anyway, setting that aside, as my colleague ref McHugh alludes to, scenarios b, c and d are all fairly standard and more or less covered by the laws (you could for instance, class taking a restart as a normal playing action). Scenarios a and e are a little more problematic however. I don't see anything in the laws that would cover these, either explicitly or implicitly. For me, a player should require permission from the referee to leave the field for injury or to change their equipment.

Now, I would say those would be pretty much automatically granted by any referee so I don't see any reason why a player wouldn't ask (or almost just notify) the referee of such an action - but the referee does need to be aware of what's going on. You can't just have players wandering off the field when they feel like it, without the referee being informed. And they definitely need the referee's permission to return.

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

See Question: 35834