Comments on: Vote: Does the Offside Law Need Changing?

By: Samuel Knight (Oudegeest)

Samuel Knight (Oudegeest) — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 17:15:47 +0000

After looking at the goal again – to me the fair call would be – if a Dutch player knocked him out of bounds – then that’s cheating and it would have been an offside.

But if another Italian player runs him over – well that shouldn’t count against the Dutch – should it?

His own goal tender knocked him down. He could have gotten up and played – but he didn’t. Too bad. Goal.

By: NoBusiness

NoBusiness — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 14:49:53 +0000

But there’s nothing in there that says “and if not, the player is immediately deemed inactive and out for the count.” That rule doesn’t exist, because that’s not how soccer is played. You’re all trying to interpret (change almost) and apply a rule that’s not for this situation.

It doesn’t matter whether he intentionally or unintentionally landed behind the lines for his “activity status”, so stop pretending it does. FACT is that there is no rule that states panucci was inactive so he wasn’t. And when the pass was made, he was in front of the attacker, so it’s not an offside. I don’t get how much simpler I can explain this?

As I said in the very first post, there was no point for that guy to be off the pitch. After the goal was made, he didn’t need treatment, he stopped grabbing for his face, he got up and continued the game after complaining to the ref, played the entire 90 minutes without treatment. There’s no special case here. Causing your own teammate to go down may have consequences for the match, boohoo cry cry and then deal with it.

By: Tomi

Tomi — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 14:26:00 +0000

You can all have a look at the official rules:
http://www.fifa.com/mm/document/affederation/federation/laws_of_the_game_0708_10565.pdf
There is no mentioning of a player being outside of the field in the actual laws of the game, but in the “Additional Instructions and Guidelines for Referees” on p. 102, it is said:
“If a defending player steps behind his own goal line in order to place
an opponent in an offside position, the referee shall allow play to
continue and caution the defender for deliberately leaving the field
of play without the referee’s permission when the ball is next out of
play.”
I think it is quite clear that Panucci did not step behind his own goal line in order to place an opponent in an offside position. If that had been the case, the rule says that in addition Panucci should have been cautioned by the referee, which did not happen.

By: NoBusiness

NoBusiness — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 11:22:45 +0000

If we care so much about rules and ignore what I just said, pls show me the rule that says any defender that is behind his own pitch (by their own actions) automatically and instantly don’t count. Thanks.

By: Ezio

Ezio — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 01:56:28 +0000

Thank you Johannes. That is all I have been trying to say. That rule, as it’s written, does not apply to what happened last night. Period. Moving on. Italy still sucked last night, would have still lost and probably would have still lost by 3 goals, but the point of this post was to discuss the rule, and I think that if it allows a situation like that of last night to not be called an offside, than it’s at best unclear and at worst totally bogus.

By: johannes

johannes — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 00:21:45 +0000

Why is reading so hard? The rule is perfectly clear. “If a defending player steps behind his own goal line in order to place an opponent in an offside position, the referee shall allow play to continue and caution the defender … etc.” None of this applied here. Everything else is beside the point.

By: Fred

Fred — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 00:14:10 +0000

The goal should have been disallowed because
A. VnR was in an offside position when the ball was played
B. NoBusiness is a gimp
C. If it was on the other end of the pitch you’d be singing a different tune
D. Because I said so.

Good Luck with France…

By: NoBusiness

NoBusiness — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 23:26:49 +0000

Actually, #3 point 2 wouldn’t have mattered either way, because it happened too fast to have stopped the game even if he was really “inactive”: injured and in need treatment. They didn’t have the time to assess his status. Which brings me back to my point that you can’t pause every game because some smuck goes down and you can’t tell what his status is and how it’s unfair if he’s down while the rest is attacking. And #4: point 3 is particularly relevant because they clearly did it to their own men, making it all the more silly to hurt the at that time attacking side.

By: NoBusiness

NoBusiness — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 22:57:27 +0000

Right, we’re pretty much in agreement except for this point:

‘I don’t think that that player should be considered active for the purpose of an offside call.’

But why? As I said: if a player normally falls down, he’s not considered “inactive”. He’s not considered “out of the game till he gets back up”. This is EXACTLY what happened here. Why do the rules change because he conveniently did this outside of the pitch? Doesn’t change anything at all. He was very much part of the game, very much active because: 1. ref didn’t stop the game for him 2. he wasn’t injured in such a way that he couldn’t get back up seconds later to continue the game. That’s really all that matters. So what if he couldn’t make it back in time to do something? That doesn’t make sense. The attacking team should never be stopped while attacking just because some smuck on the other team falls down and can’t get back up fast enough “to be of any use”. Your own fault. That goes double in this “friendly fire” case.

And ruling in favor of the defense doesn’t make sense at all. The offside rule wasn’t made so people could pull the defensive offside trick. The fight was right there up in front of the goal. Clearly, the attackers shouldn’t be caught in such a lame trap if they bring the fight to them. And I bet it’s exactly this reason why the same thing doesn’t go for attackers.

And this offside out of pitch rule makes perfect sense to me. Let’s not even talk about defense abusing it (which they will). What if an attacker conveniently drops behind the goal, waits for someone to pass it in his direction (NOTE not TO him, because once he’s off the pitch, he doesn’t count, right? So you can’t play offside when you’re passing to “empty space”!), then the guy runs back out and boom, only him and the goalie. That’d be sweet to be an attacker who conveniently missteps and falls behind the goal line when his team is attacking. Give me a break.

By: anonymous

anonymous — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 22:23:51 +0000

let’s get rid of the offside rule. let’s change the name of this website to the ‘offyourknocker’. oh, and you can use your hands if you are past three defenders on a Sunday wearing a green shirt when playing in front of a crowd less than 24,000.

or let’s think for a second. there’s a reason this rule has been around as long as it has.