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Fernando Tresaco Gracia, Referees Coordinator for the FIFA World Youth Championship Netherlands 2005. Lee Mills ACTION IMAGES

FIFA World Youth Championship
Netherlands 2005 to pioneer use of offside rule clarifications

The FIFA World Youth Championship set to be played in the Netherlands between 10 June and 2 July 2005, will be the first opportunity to see the practical application of the changes made at the 119th Annual General Meeting of the International Football Association Board, held on 26 February in Cardiff, Wales, with respect to the laws relating to offside, unsporting behaviour and players' equipment.

"Law 11, which relates to offside, has not changed in essence.  The competition will see the new interpretations of the law as approved by the IFAB at their meeting in February in Wales," explains Fernando Tresaco Gracia, Netherlands 2005 Referees Coordinator.

For more information on the offside law, refer to the flash animation.

The text approved by the IFAB with regard to deciding whether or not a player is actively involved in play clarifies the three issues of interfering with play, interfering with an opponent or gaining an advantage by being in an offside position. The text says the following:

• Interfering with play means playing or touching the ball passed or touched by a team-mate.
• Interfering with an opponent means preventing an opponent from playing or being able to play the ball by clearly obstructing the opponent's line of vision or movements or making a gesture or movement which, in the opinion of the referee, deceives or distracts an opponent.
• Gaining an advantage by being in an offside position means playing a ball that rebounds to him off a post or crossbar or playing a ball that rebounds to him off an opponent having been in an offside position.

 "In essence, what it means is that if an attacking player is in an offside position, but not interfering with an opponent, the referee must wait until he touches the ball before penalising him for being offside. We want the referee's assistant to wait a little longer before deciding if the player in the offside position is actively interfering with play," says Tresaco Gracia.

If the attacking player in an offside position is running towards the ball and touches it, only when contact with the ball has been made should the assistant raise his flag. If contact is not made, then play should continue.

"However, if a player's position interferes with an opponent, preventing him from reaching or playing the ball, or results in impaired vision for a goalkeeper or defender, the referee need not wait until said player touches the ball before sanctioning the offence," he clarifies.

One of the missions for the referees at the FIFA World Youth Championship is to apply the new interpretation of Law 11. (ACTION IMAGES) Lee Mills

"We believe that with these clarifications, there will be much more uniformity in the application of a norm that has caused quite a lot of confusion. Now it's much clearer," the Refereeing Coordinator says. "We've worked on these points with the referees and they seem very comfortable with them. We've had no complaints with respect to these instructions," he adds.

From these clarifications, it can now be seen that if an attacking player in an offside position is not interfering with an opponent, or in the line of sight of a goalkeeper, and not touching the ball, a foul is not committed.

An experiment in this tournament will be the use of yellow cards to sanction unsporting conduct deliberately used to waste time. To find out more about the testing of the new experiment - Click here. 

 "If a player from the side that has been penalised deliberately touches the ball after the referee stops the game for a free kick, this will be considered as delaying the restart of the game and shall be sanctioned with a yellow card. These sanctions shall be applied equally to players who touch the ball after conceding a throw in or corner kick and to players who keep possession of a ball after their team has conceded a goal," the law goes on to say.

This is intended to do away with unsporting conduct aimed at wasting time by holding onto the ball. It is also aimed at avoiding altercations instigated by players taking possession of the ball after the whistle has blown.

"We'll also be rigorous in enforcing the laws relating to players' equipment in this championship, and would remind players that it is strictly forbidden to enter the field of play wearing potentially dangerous items such as pendants, necklaces or rings," Fernando Tresaco Gracia says. He also added that it was not permitted to cover those items with adhesive tape as this does not entirely eliminate the risk of injury.

Original link:  http://www.fifa.com/en/news/feature/0,1451,107252,00.html