A&H

Handball Summary

NOVARef

Active Member
I just received this week. To me, these slides do very little to clarify.


First, why not just add the exception to the fourth point in the fourth point instead of adding another slide. Does this exception imply that the exception is only applicable if the hand arm is above or beyond shoulder level and NOT if straight out at shoulder level or lower?

Then it goes on to state what are NON OFFENSES and it repeats that it's not a handball if the ball touches a players arm/hand directly from the players own head or body (and I assume this includes the foot).

Can someone write these rules so they are easy to understand? : )
 
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I just received this week. To me, these slides do very little to clarify.


First, why not just add the exception to the fourth point in the fourth point instead of adding another slide. Does this exception imply that the exception is only applicable if the hand arm is above or beyond shoulder level and NOT if straight out at shoulder level or lower?

Then it goes on to state what are NON OFFENSES and it repeats that it's not a handball if the ball touches a players arm/hand directly from the players own head or body (and I assume this includes the foot).

Can someone write these rules so they are easy to understand? : )
Exception to exception? You couldn't make it up!
 
I just received this week. To me, these slides do very little to clarify.


First, why not just add the exception to the fourth point in the fourth point instead of adding another slide. Does this exception imply that the exception is only applicable if the hand arm is above or beyond shoulder level and NOT if straight out at shoulder level or lower?

Then it goes on to state what are NON OFFENSES and it repeats that it's not a handball if the ball touches a players arm/hand directly from the players own head or body (and I assume this includes the foot).

Can someone write these rules so they are easy to understand? : )
The American football authorities have managed to add an exception to an exception, which in the IFAB version is more compact.
 
I'm not sure I understand where the confusion is coming from. It is not a handball offense if the player plays the ball and it rebounds directly and hits their arm, even if their arm is in an unnatural position.
 
I'm not sure I understand where the confusion is coming from. It is not a handball offense if the player plays the ball and it rebounds directly and hits their arm, even if their arm is in an unnatural position.
For me, the confusion is that the exception is only added to the bullet point that says when the arm is ABOVE the shoulder. They did NOT add the exception to the bullet point of "unnaturally bigger".
 
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I'm not sure I understand where the confusion is coming from. It is not a handball offense if the player plays the ball and it rebounds directly and hits their arm, even if their arm is in an unnatural position.
Wherever it is coming from it has confuse you for one :)

This is the law:

Screenshot_20201123-235354.jpg
Nowhere in there there is an exception to unnatural position (made body unnaturally bigger to use the exact wording). That point on 'unnatural' is on its own. Playing the ball and then hitting the arm exception is only applicable if the arm is above shoulder.

If that confusion is clear now, let me confuse you with this one. Even if the player plays the ball and hits the arm above shoulder (exception right, well...) You can still penalise it for handball by applying the first point because the hand has made the body unnaturally bigger.
 
Wherever it is coming from it has confuse you for one :)

This is the law:

View attachment 4681
Nowhere in there there is an exception to unnatural position (made body unnaturally bigger to use the exact wording). That point on 'unnatural' is on its own. Playing the ball and then hitting the arm exception is only applicable if the arm is above shoulder.

If that confusion is clear now, let me confuse you with this one. Even if the player plays the ball and hits the arm above shoulder (exception right, well...) You can still penalise it for handball by applying the first point because the hand has made the body unnaturally bigger.
For me it's clear that they don't want this to be a handball (from the language and also the video that was shared on here a few months ago...was it months?). Anyway....I would not call a handball if the ball comes off the player's body (including foot) and hit an arm above the shoulder UNLESS it scored a goal, created a goal scoring opportunity, or if I felt it was deliberate.
 
For me it's clear that they don't want this to be a handball (from the language and also the video that was shared on here a few months ago...was it months?). Anyway....I would not call a handball if the ball comes off the player's body (including foot) and hit an arm above the shoulder UNLESS it scored a goal, created a goal scoring opportunity, or if I felt it was deliberate.

I think you are conflating the two concepts incorrectly.
  • It is an offense, even if natural position, if the ball hits the arm about the shoulder. For that offense we forgive it if the player deliberately plays the ball
  • It is a separate offense to have the arm in an unnatural position--it is, more or less, considered a type of deliberate action to take space away from the opponent. We do not forgive a player who does that if deliberately playing the ball--because the unnatural position that made him bigger is an unfair advantage.
Law 12 is pretty clear about this, as @one pointed out already.
 
I think you are conflating the two concepts incorrectly.
  • It is an offense, even if natural position, if the ball hits the arm about the shoulder. For that offense we forgive it if the player deliberately plays the ball
  • It is a separate offense to have the arm in an unnatural position--it is, more or less, considered a type of deliberate action to take space away from the opponent. We do not forgive a player who does that if deliberately playing the ball--because the unnatural position that made him bigger is an unfair advantage.
Law 12 is pretty clear about this, as @one pointed out already.
Following the same point structure concept, the very first main dot point for it is an offence is if a player:" deliberately touches the ball with their hand/arm, including moving the hand/arm towards the ball". This is independent of the points you explained (the meaning of the word including is disputed here).

Imagine a player whose arm/hand has not made his body unnaturally bigger (down next to his body or whatever that position may be), plays/controlls the ball but the ball bounces up next to him higher that he wants. He then clearly deliberately taps the ball to the ground with a flick of his fingers (or wrist). This scenario is not covered by the earlier discussed points but by the latter point I mentioned.

The point I mentioned in this post basically makes all other points redundant or as they used to be called 'considerations'. However the way they are written confuse everything.

The people who write the laws are probably brilliant in recognising a handball but very poor at putting it into words.
 
The people who write the laws are probably brilliant in recognising a handball but very poor at putting it into words.
There is a great interview from a couple of years ago with one of the committee members for the re-write talking about the process and the geographic disagreements on what was or was not a hand ball. Based on that, like much committee writing, I'm not entirely convinced that the folks who wrote it completely agree as to what it means.
 
That could make sense. A collection of disjointed points put in by different people who can't agree on what it should convey as a whole.
 
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