Question Number: 35933

Law 11 - Offside 6/13/2025

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

This question is a follow up to question 35926

Thanks. Honestly, I'm a little confused.

Mr. McHugh says the time is 35:44. According to Mr. Dawson, it's 35:42, my understanding.

The coach of the Norwegian team said this:

'I’m very curious why they have only changed the rule for throws by the keeper, and not for other types of passes, such as scoop and swivel passes,” Nielsen told the Guardian.'

Full article here:

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2025/jun/12/offside-law-changed-after-swedish-third-tier-clubs-pressure-pays-off

So is that trick allowed? Otherwise, Norwegians are very smart guys. I've seen this ambiguity there for a long time. :-)

(In my opinion, if the trick is allowed, it's another nonsense. That rare kick is technically the same as a goalkeeper throw.)

Thanks!

Answer provided by Referee Richard Dawson

Hi Petr,
don't overthink it too much. Players will still be able to dribble the ball and every contact point will be a new reset but if it's resting on the foot as a swivel and like a continual throw like a keeper. You're not gonna get that hangtime to be added before the officials have already decided if the Teammates receiving the ball were in an offside position or not. The difference between controlling the ball, stopping putting your foot on the ball rolling it around a bit to settle or perhaps shield it and then make a pass with it it isn't quite the same thing as the circumvent of offside timing Criteria.

They're not moving to a new position in other words the ball isn't rolling away from their foot, it just takes a little bit of time to toss a ball than to kick or in this case play the play the cutey lift and balance reminding me of the old Blanco Bunny hop lol

I wouldn't sweat it too much, because in games at the recreational level, the on field officials will do the best they can on whatever they saw. At the recreational level we're not sitting there with a stopwatch timing when a ball rebounds off a foot. I will let the technical warriors of VAR decide how to handle a release point

Don't forget when they changed the law of goal kicks not having to leave the penalty area players adapted that quite quickly to take advantage of the loophole and they were heading the ball back to the keeper all the time because the opposition wasn't allowed inside the penalty area. They couldn't challenge, it was unfair and a work around the infamous misnamed pass back law. Where it was a cautionable INDFK action if you tried. Hence they adapted the LOTG once again to fix the problem they created as in this offside little glitch. Cheers

Answer provided by Referee Joe McHugh

hi Petr
I remember back in the day this goal
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ro5jIT_tvZ0

At the time it caused a great debate. I believe Law13 was amended as a result to state ** A free kick can be taken by lifting the ball with a foot or both feet simultaneously.**

So for me the Torns argument is an outlier as how many players are going to keep the ball on the foot for an extended period and for what purpose?
Are most kicks going to be on a foot for 2 seconds? The way VAR is assessed it looks to me that the freeze frame is at the moment of the kick so in your scenario for me it is the moment of the kick at 35.44.
I’m sure that VAR operators are trained in the setting of the freeze frame in line with protocols. I have never seen any freeze frame with anything other than the ball at the moment of the kick at the foot etc