A&H

Goalkeeper Rule Question

al_2113

New Member
Level 7 Referee
Good morning, I have a question about the goalkeeper.
Goalkeeper throws the ball up with his hand inside the penalty area in order to kick it long with his foot, but his foot makes contact with the ball just past the penalty box line. Is this permitted within the laws of the game?

I hope you can understand what I mean.
 
The Referee Store
Yep.
All that is important is where the goalkeeper releases the ball from their hand(s). Providing this is within the penalty area (which includes the line of the area) then they can kick it from wherever they like.
 
Good morning, I have a question about the goalkeeper.
Goalkeeper throws the ball up with his hand inside the penalty area in order to kick it long with his foot, but his foot makes contact with the ball just past the penalty box line. Is this permitted within the laws of the game?

I hope you can understand what I mean.
Why wouldn’t it be? The only restriction on. GK is the use of hands in the PA. He can kick the ball anywhere on the field.

The only thing to watch for is when the ball leaves the hands—as long as any part of the ball is over any part of the PA line when the GK let’s go of the ball, he’s done nothing wrong. And it’s not something to nitpick on and watch for minor violation.

now, I don’t know if you are ref, a player, or a coach. What I wrote is what a ref should be doing. As a coach, however, I told GK’s not to mess with the line. Getting an extra foot on a punt has very little value, so why give the R/AR the chance to get it wrong? (My son only started listening to me on that after he got called twice (both times incorrectly) in the same game . . . )
 
Only call gk handling outside the area when kicking the ball if you're really, really sure. There have been a couple of high profile instances of AR's getting this horribly wrong in top level games.

A prime example being this one involving Pepe Reina. Reina clearly releases the ball from his hand inside the area then kicks it when it's outside the area (which, just to confirm the answers already given to the OP, is completely legal).

Incident starts @ 2:15.


To add insult to injury (for Liverpool at least) Bolton scored from the resulting free kick.
 
Only call gk handling outside the area when kicking the ball if you're really, really sure. There have been a couple of high profile instances of AR's getting this horribly wrong in top level games.

A prime example being this one involving Pepe Reina. Reina clearly releases the ball from his hand inside the area then kicks it when it's outside the area (which, just to confirm the answers already given to the OP, is completely legal).

Incident starts @ 2:15.


To add insult to injury (for Liverpool at least) Bolton scored from the resulting free kick.
And the assistant involved, Andy Halliday, had a long break from Premier League duties as a result.
 
At grassroots, this is something that can be good for the pre-match with inexperienced NARs.

In football, at grassroots, flagging this offense is usually totally unexpected and really no one wants it.

So much better if a beginner AR learns to be proactive and e.g. tells the GK to make it “obviously” inside!
 
At grassroots, this is something that can be good for the pre-match with inexperienced NARs.

In football, at grassroots, flagging this offense is usually totally unexpected and really no one wants it.

So much better if a beginner AR learns to be proactive and e.g. tells the GK to make it “obviously” inside!
But don't shout out to the keeper, as one of my ARs did, "Keeper, you were miles out of your area there" 🤦‍♂️
 
I had an AR flag the keeper in a 14U game, and waved him down as I was doubtful and didn’t want a “gotcha” call and called the keeper to watch the line. Next time the GK got the ball, I cheated back to be sure I could see it. Flag goes up again, and it was clearly not handling, so I waved him down again, much to the outrage of one touchline. We talked at half, and he asked why I waved him down as the GK’s plant foot was clearly outside the PA. :wall: He was sure that someone had taught him that was what he was supposed to watch for. :rolleyes: Of course, the take away for the other team was that I was an idiot who took two key free kicks away from them, which must have been why they lost. With newerARs, this is absolutely part of my pregame. (Though the AR in my story was experienced upenough I wouldn’t have found it something that needed to be said.)
 
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