Two questions from today's game

[bobmac]

White goalie has possession and advances towards Green goal. When he is about 20 yards from Green goal the CBO whistles, and momentarily after he does so Goalie is checked and loses possession. Check is fair. White were offside in possession. Change of possession, ball awarded to Green, whistle & Green commence to move ball upfield. White goalie running back to his crease.
White coach complains that I did not allow time for White goalie to get back to his crease before blowing my whistle. My explanation was that I am not required to do that. Had the white goalie taken a shot & it was saved Green would have been able to commence an attack immediately without waiting for White goalie to make his ground. Coach said that because I had blown whistle the ball was dead & therefore I should have let goalie return to defence before restarting game.

Aware that if goalie chases ball to end line behind goal after shot it is unwritten rule to allow him to regain ground

Responses? Observations?

Push by White player in green half. Time served, free clear for Green at half way. Whilst ball is being moved up White decide to make substitution in attack. White attacker leaves thru the gate, but is not immediately replaced by oncoming player. Whistle goes to restart game with free clear at halfway & white only have two players in attack half of field. 3rd white attacker joins play after 3-4 seconds, a clear and obvious delay after the whistle sounds. CBO flags for White offside as only 2 players in attacking half when play recommenced. By own admission coach said it was a "slow substitution". White to serve 30 seconds for being offside not in possession.

Again, what would you have done? What should I have done.

[bobmac]

For the Durham lads - its a girl!

[LivTeamJones26]

White goalie has possession and advances towards Green goal. When he is about 20 yards from Green goal the CBO whistles, and momentarily after he does so Goalie is checked and loses possession. Check is fair. White were offside in possession. Change of possession, ball awarded to Green, whistle & Green commence to move ball upfield. White goalie running back to his crease.
White coach complains that I did not allow time for White goalie to get back to his crease before blowing my whistle. My explanation was that I am not required to do that. Had the white goalie taken a shot & it was saved Green would have been able to commence an attack immediately without waiting for White goalie to make his ground. Coach said that because I had blown whistle the ball was dead & therefore I should have let goalie return to defence before restarting game.

Aware that if goalie chases ball to end line behind goal after shot it is unwritten rule to allow him to regain ground

.

By the time you'd checked with CBO why they'd blow their whistle, awarded possession to green and blown your whistle to restart the game, white goalie should have already been back in their crease. If they decided to dawdle on the half way line waiting for your decision that's their fault, even if the ball remains white you'd hardly expect the goalie to carry on his run!!!


As for the substitution, bit of a tough one as they only had six in defence, but I'd still stick with the decision and again blame the team if the complained for not getting their act together an subbing properly

[ibop]

The first I think could be argued both ways, green will complain if you wait, white if you don't. I'd wait, probably use the time it takes to inform the goalie of the position of the ball to cover the gap and justify the slight delay of the whistle.

The second I have as legal play, delayed substitution is legal, no advantage gained (still only 6 men in defence). If you start talking about 30 seconds, then I would throw a flag.

I don't have my rulebook to hand though..... I do know that Durham 1s bleat & make a fuss even when you get decisions spot on (making the dangerous assumption I got at least one decision right!)

[laxambition]

Scenario 1: correct call by official. The things which delay a restart are: relaying the call to the bench, picking up your flag(s), making sure one person of the correct team has the ball ready to start in the correct place and with no-one within 5 yards, relaying the number of that player to the goaalkeeper. If the goalie still hasn't regained his ground, maybe he should consider not trying to go "coast-to-coast" next time!

I think I have read that the NCAA no longer allow the time for the goalie to regain his crease when chasing to X, but I may have mis-remembered that; and it's only ever been a gentleman's agreement in English/ International rules AFAIK.

Scenario 2: legal play

AR 46.3 A player has left the field so that he can be substituted.

The replacing player attempts to gain a tactical advantage
by not going onto the field immediately.

RULING: Legal play, as nothing in the rules requires a team to have ten men in the game at any time.

Ok, so they weren't seeking a tactical advantage, they were just not very observant, but they did have the correct number of players in the defensive half, so I think this still applies

[wimmerlax]

Cant quote a rule or anything, but playing International Rules, there seems to be a time period during substitution where the replacement player must step on the field before a penalty is called (3-4 seconds) Being a LSM i've had this convosation with a few CBO's in the past.

after that i can see that they could be called for being one man short in attack and therefore offside.

[Chilli]

RULING: Legal play, as nothing in the rules requires a team to have ten men in the game at any time.

IMHO, the above can't over-ride the requirement to maintain the offside rule.

The ruling is surely intended to cover for the situation where the team is not offside at either end but for whatever reason a replacement delays his entry onto the field, it is not intended to allow teams to play an 'officially approved' offside and gain some form of advantage.

A short delay (not defined) on replacing a player in the offence half can be tolerated (e.g. dropped stick, glove came off, tripped and fell etc) but any deliberate tactical delay (e.g. waiting in subs area to pounce on a restart from behind) resulting in only two men in the offence would have to be a foul.
Fully accept that we're into subjective territory about 'deliberate' and that it's not likely to happen very often.

[Chilli]

Also the ruling covers for the much more frequent situation where a player runs out over the sidelines while chasing an opponent.
If the rules were that you 'had' to maintain ten on the field 'at all times' then each time someone ran out the team would be committing a foul which is clearly nonsense and therefore the ruling allows teams not to have all ten men on the field.

[laxambition]

Also the ruling covers for the much more frequent situation where a player runs out over the sidelines while chasing an opponent.
If the rules were that you 'had' to maintain ten on the field 'at all times' then each time someone ran out the team would be committing a foul which is clearly nonsense and therefore the ruling allows teams not to have all ten men on the field.

that's covered elsewhere: Rule 65.4

[laxambition]

RULING: Legal play, as nothing in the rules requires a team to have ten men in the game at any time.

IMHO, the above can't over-ride the requirement to maintain the offside rule.

The ruling is surely intended to cover for the situation where the team is not offside at either end but for whatever reason a replacement delays his entry onto the field, it is not intended to allow teams to play an 'officially approved' offside and gain some form of advantage.

A short delay (not defined) on replacing a player in the offence half can be tolerated (e.g. dropped stick, glove came off, tripped and fell etc) but any deliberate tactical delay (e.g. waiting in subs area to pounce on a restart from behind) resulting in only two men in the offence would have to be a foul.
Fully accept that we're into subjective territory about 'deliberate' and that it's not likely to happen very often.

I may have clouded the waters a bit by quoting the AR, but I think that most posters on here (including you possibly) are arguing the same:

As described, the situation was that due to confusion for a matter of 3-4 seconds the team were a man down in attack, but were not a man up in defence. There was no tactical advantage gained in the situation (unlike the "normal" offside situation where you end up with 7 in defence) and in practice I would guess that most of us on a Saturday would have allowed play on

[bobmac]

Thanks for those observations guys. With the benefit of hindsight & collective thoughts I probably got 50% of those decisions correct! If the missing attackman happens again I'll obviously have to whistle the CBO's flag, and advise that the attackman should get on the pitch with more haste & leave it at that.

With regard to the comments about Durham they didn't whinge any more than many other teams & a lot, lot less than some. Discussion with the coach & captain was polite and my explanations accepted without comment. Durham did have cause for complaint when for a short period Nottingham got overly physical & the ref (me) could have/should have stepped in a little earlier. Hindsight is a marvellous thing!

Didn't have the opportunity to discuss with coaches after game as had to rush off to an imminent birth, but did explain to the coach that I would post on this forum so that the views of others could be canvassed.