Offside law query (amateur linesman)

[JonathanG]

Hi all, I've been running the line this season as my son's team has just moved up to under 11s. So far so good but I had an incident on Sunday that I wanted to research and it seems as though it wasn't as straightforward as I thought.

Ball is played into the home team's penalty area, everyone onside. Attacking player tackled, ball runs free. Attacking player gets up and then walks into an offside position. Defender controls ball, moves it onto his stronger foot and attempts to clear upfield. Ball strikes a player in front of the defender (I believe another defender but he was close to an attacking player, both of whom were trying to protect themselves/avoid the ball as it was being struck with force) and ricochets to the attacker who is standing beyond the last defender (i.e. in an offside position) and scores.

I didn't flag for offside but the home team's manager was convinced I should have done because he believed it struck an attacking player before ricocheting. I said I felt it was onside because it hit a defender. He seemed to think it was offside anyway even if it had struck a defender.

Having done some research I found a thread on this site that confirmed it was indeed onside if the player it struck was a defender (I thought I was going mad!). But in the same thread it mentioned that the key moment is "the last deliberate play". Given that the "last deliberate play" was the defender's clearance, then does it matter which player it hit? i.e. If it hit the attacker but he was trying to get out of the way then it's not a deliberate play, and so the attacker in an offside position is onside.

Thanks in advance for your help

 

[JamesL]

Hi all, I've been running the line this season as my son's team has just moved up to under 11s. So far so good but I had an incident on Sunday that I wanted to research and it seems as though it wasn't as straightforward as I thought.

Ball is played into the home team's penalty area, everyone onside. Attacking player tackled, ball runs free. Attacking player gets up and then walks into an offside position. Defender controls ball, moves it onto his stronger foot and attempts to clear upfield. Ball strikes a player in front of the defender (I believe another defender but he was close to an attacking player, both of whom were trying to protect themselves/avoid the ball as it was being struck with force) and ricochets to the attacker who is standing beyond the last defender (i.e. in an offside position) and scores.

I didn't flag for offside but the home team's manager was convinced I should have done because he believed it struck an attacking player before ricocheting. I said I felt it was onside because it hit a defender. He seemed to think it was offside anyway even if it had struck a defender.

Having done some research I found a thread on this site that confirmed it was indeed onside if the player it struck was a defender (I thought I was going mad!). But in the same thread it mentioned that the key moment is "the last deliberate play". Given that the "last deliberate play" was the defender's clearance, then does it matter which player it hit? i.e. If it hit the attacker but he was trying to get out of the way then it's not a deliberate play, and so the attacker in an offside position is onside.

Thanks in advance for your help

Try not to confuse the two. The deliberate play is for when offside is "reset" following a defender deliberately playing the ball, but that is only up to the next point an attacker players or touches the ball again.

Simply, A player may be penalised for offside if, at the point it was last played or touched by a team mate, they were in an offside position and then they:
Play the ball
Interfere with an opponent
Gain an advantage

(There's a lot more detail about each of these offside offences in the LOTG and it you are serious about understanding it then read up on it as they don't necessarily mean exactly what they say on the tin.)

 

[Viridis1886]

I think from your description then the following applies...

If it ricocheted back off a defender then onside and a goal.

If it ricocheted back off an attacker then offside and not a goal.

If you couldn't see, and I imagine from your position it sounds hard to see, then you would need the support of the ref to pick out what happened.

 

[Russell Jones]

More generally, these types of 'unexpected' decisions around offside position are often the hardest to get right. You are not imagining that the ball will ricochet off an attacking player so are not prepared to make the necessary judgement. A great insight into the necessity to stay switched on as an Assistant and to 'expect the unexpected'!