A&H

Shoulders when running together

C

cZulu

New Member
Level 7 Referee
Red and Blue player running towards the ball, the ball is not in playing distance and one player uses their strength to 'shoulder' the opponent player off their running line.

Always a foul for charging/pushing? Or is your decision influenced by factors such as playing distance from the ball, carelessness/recklessness, trajectory of the run, 50/50ness of the pushing, etc.?

How do you judge this and is anything explicit in law?
 
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Pushing requires hands.
Charging requires momentum.

If they're running alongside each other and a player uses pure shoulder-to-shoulder strength to get the opponent to lose out, I'm happy to let it go. I'd only be penalising if the hands come out, or if the "winning" player has used a bit of distance to gain speed and win the challenge by deliberately hitting the opponent with speed at an angle.

I think some on here would argue that even giving a foul for the latter of those can be harsh - but the law is very vague on what constitutes a "fair charge", so my instinct is to broadly punish most things that look like a solid impact.
 
GraemeS said:
I think some on here would argue that even giving a foul for the latter of those can be harsh - but the law is very vague on what constitutes a "fair charge", so my instinct is to broadly punish most things that look like a solid impact.
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I agree, the LOTG is vague on this subject. This is very much a scenario where you have to see it to have a feeling whether it's a foul or not. Often it's an instinct type of decision - if it doesn't look right then it's probably a foul.
 
cZulu said:
Red and Blue player running towards the ball, the ball is not in playing distance and one player uses their strength to 'shoulder' the opponent player off their running line.

Always a foul for charging/pushing? Or is your decision influenced by factors such as playing distance from the ball, carelessness/recklessness, trajectory of the run, 50/50ness of the pushing, etc.?

How do you judge this and is anything explicit in law?
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Where was the "strong" player going - toward the ball and competing for space, with contact a secondary consequence of wanting the first opportunity to play the ball, or towards the opponent and invading space, with contact the purpose to prevent the opponent from having an opportunity at all?

Or, shorter:
  • Towards ball? Wants to get there first out of two? Good.
  • Towards player? Wants to get there first out of one? Bad.
 
My feeling is that this topic will run and run! It was raised in this forum back in 2016 (with some current contributors active then as well). Historically, an otherwise fair charge made when the ball was not in playing distance resulted in an indirect free kick. That changed when IFAB moved towards physical offences resulting in direct free kicks. Nothing in recent FA/IFAB/FIFA releases as far as I can see, but the definition of a fair challenge from the FA guidance in 2014 still stands: The act of charging is a challenge for space using physical contact within playing distance of the ball without using arms or elbows.
So, going back to the post, and of course subject to the referee's opinion, a direct free kick is correct in law.
Feel free to discuss!:)
 
I agree with @ChasTutorObserver that an otherwise legal charge away from playing distance is a charging offense and a DFK. So as described in the OP, it's a foul. I do think it also has potential to be trifling and not warrant a call--a bit of a have to be there to see the play.
 
According to law 12, a charge is only penalised "when a player shows a lack of attention or consideration when making a challenge or acts without precaution". A fair shoulder charge is acceptable.
 
Mr Dean said:
According to law 12, a charge is only penalised "when a player shows a lack of attention or consideration when making a challenge or acts without precaution". A fair shoulder charge is acceptable.
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I'm not sure what you're implying here. Let's say the ball is 70 yards away at the other end of the pitch and a defender makes an otherwise "fair shoulder charge" on an opponent. Are you saying that's acceptable?
 
Mr Dean said:
According to law 12, a charge is only penalised "when a player shows a lack of attention or consideration when making a challenge or acts without precaution". A fair shoulder charge is acceptable.
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I would consider a shoulder to shoulder challenge careless if the ball is not in playing distance . . .
 
Peter Grove said:
I'm not sure what you're implying here. Let's say the ball is 70 yards away at the other end of the pitch and a defender makes an otherwise "fair shoulder charge" on an opponent. Are you saying that's acceptable?
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ChasTutorObserver said:
I would consider a shoulder to shoulder challenge careless if the ball is not in playing distance . . .
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If they are running towards the ball, they are competing/challenging for the ball. If the charging player is not challenging for the ball, it's probably violent conduct.

Depends how much force is used. Shoulder to shoulder challenges are an accepted part of football. Ultimately, the referee decides whether the challenge meets the careless (or, reckless, ect) criteria.
 
I don't know why we are limiting this debate/discussion to charge and why the laws are only referring to a charge that can be fair. All this can be applied to push, kick, jump etc. If it is not careless, reckless or URF, even if there is contact, it is fair.

Ball being in playing distance may change the threshold but is not the determining factor. I can certainly consider a fair charge (or push or..) when the ball is 50 yards away but it is about to be kicked in the direction of two players challenging for the same space. It all depends on the the point of contact (charger and charger), direction, amount of force, and a few other context dependent factors.
 
one said:
I don't know why we are limiting this debate/discussion to charge and why the laws are only referring to a charge that can be fair. All this can be applied to push, kick, jump etc. If it is not careless, reckless or URF, even if there is contact, it is fair.

Ball being in playing distance may change the threshold but is not the determining factor. I can certainly consider a fair charge (or push or..) when the ball is 50 yards away but it is about to be kicked in the direction of two players challenging for the same space. It all depends on the the point of contact (charger and charger), direction, amount of force, and a few other context dependent factors.
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Not sure I agree. A implies B does not automatically mean that B implies A.

Just because we are instructed to sanction a careless, reckless or excessively forceful push (for example), it doesn't automatically imply that there is such a thing as a fair push. Unless specifically stated elsewhere in the laws, there does not have to be such a thing as a fair kick of an opponent, or a fair trip. And one entirely possible conclusion is that any trip or any kick of an opponent will be careless at least.

Maybe at one point the FA sent out a memo saying that they considered there to be such a thing as a fair charge, or even that they specifically defined what qualified. But I can't find it in the current LOTG - so it's an entirely reasonable conclusion that I am entitled to see any "charge" as careless and penalise for it. Again, as I said in my first reply in this thread: It's vague, so each referee just has to stick to their own interpretation of what's considered correct.
 
GraemeS said:
Not sure I agree. A implies B does not automatically mean that B implies A.

Just because we are instructed to sanction a careless, reckless or excessively forceful push (for example), it doesn't automatically imply that there is such a thing as a fair push. Unless specifically stated elsewhere in the laws, there does not have to be such a thing as a fair kick of an opponent, or a fair trip. And one entirely possible conclusion is that any trip or any kick of an opponent will be careless at least.

Maybe at one point the FA sent out a memo saying that they considered there to be such a thing as a fair charge, or even that they specifically defined what qualified. But I can't find it in the current LOTG - so it's an entirely reasonable conclusion that I am entitled to see any "charge" as careless and penalise for it. Again, as I said in my first reply in this thread: It's vague, so each referee just has to stick to their own interpretation of what's considered correct.
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While you A,B logic is correct it does not apply or relevant here. I did not (mis)use that logic.

Law 12 says
A direct free kick is awarded if a player commits any of the following offences against an opponent in a manner considered by the referee to be careless, reckless or using excessive force:

It's just common language use that this means there are cases which those seven actions are not considered one of those three conditions. I called them fair. You can call them what you like, footballing tackle/push, incidental strike/kick, part of the game jump/trip...

the outcome of all is they are not fouls which is exactly what a fair charge is considering the context of the debate.
 
I'm with one here.

There are fair trips, and there are fair kicks and an example of that is when this happens incidentally and we can say its is normal football contact. So when a player makes a fair sliding tackle that also trips up the opponent, he has tripped his opponent fairly as the challenge was not CRUEF..
 
ChasTutorObserver said:
My feeling is that this topic will run and run! It was raised in this forum back in 2016 (with some current contributors active then as well). Historically, an otherwise fair charge made when the ball was not in playing distance resulted in an indirect free kick. That changed when IFAB moved towards physical offences resulting in direct free kicks. Nothing in recent FA/IFAB/FIFA releases as far as I can see, but the definition of a fair challenge from the FA guidance in 2014 still stands: The act of charging is a challenge for space using physical contact within playing distance of the ball without using arms or elbows.
So, going back to the post, and of course subject to the referee's opinion, a direct free kick is correct in law.
Feel free to discuss!:)
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Agreed.

A thread I posted up from about 10 months ago showed the difference of opinion (notwithstanding it involved Man Utd) within the membership on this subject.
I considered this a foul on Jones (30 seconds into the clip) all day long. :)
 
one said:
While you A,B logic is correct it does not apply or relevant here. I did not (mis)use that logic.

Law 12 says
A direct free kick is awarded if a player commits any of the following offences against an opponent in a manner considered by the referee to be careless, reckless or using excessive force:

It's just common language use that this means there are cases which those seven actions are not considered one of those three conditions. I called them fair. You can call them what you like, footballing tackle/push, incidental strike/kick, part of the game jump/trip...

the outcome of all is they are not fouls which is exactly what a fair charge is considering the context of the debate.
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But what you're describing (incidental, often accidental contact) is very different to the notion we're discussing - which is that idea that someone can deliberately charge an opponent in challenging for a ball, but somehow you've carved out a space in the laws for that to be done fairly?

Again, what we're probably struggling with is the idea that the LOTG insists on making up it's own version of English. Anything at all that I would consider a "charge" in the English language sense of the word, would qualify for careless at the very least - so I struggle to visualise such a thing as a fair charge. If you're including "2 people touching shoulders while challenging for the ball" as a type of charge, then I accept there's room for that to be considered a fair charge, but I think you'd get some very funny looks if you used that description to explain a decision in the middle of a football pitch!
 
Big Cat said:
Mr Safe....
I'd wanna play on, but it's a defensive freekick if you've left your headache tablets at home
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Yeah, like I said at the time BC, at that level, we've the benefit of slo-mo cameras, various angles and endless scrutiny after the fact and it's good to debate this stuff on this forum .... for me though, Step 7 and below, on my Saturday afternoon park - I'm giving the DFK and bringing them back. :) :cool:
 
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