Good morning all. It was a thrilling Monday in the soccer world, with Italy’s Euro collapse against the Netherlands dominating the headlines. Here are some other stories from Monday as well as this morning, including an explanation on the Dutch team’s controversial first goal in its 3-0 win.
UEFA clarifies offside ruling
When Ruud van Nistelrooy scored the Netherlands’ first goal against Italy, he looked completely offside at first glance, but what wasn’t clear to most observers was the fact that Italy defender Christian Panucci was laying on the ground out of bounds, next to the Italy goal, which played van Nistelrooy onside.
The rule is a clear one, and let’s face it folks, the Dutch were always going to beat Italy, with or without that first goal.
Riquelme and Veron get Argentina calls
Juan Riquelme and Juan Veron were called up by Argentina for its upcoming World Cup qualifiers against Ecuador and Brazil.
Argentina manager Alfio Basile, dogged by Riquelme questions all week during Argentina’s tour of the United States, called up Riquelme and stated that the Boca Juniors playmaker is still a first-choice national team player.
Mexican GK arrested in Chicago
Mexican national team goalkeeper Oswaldo Sanchez posted a shutout on Sunday night in Chicago in Mexico’s 4-0 win against Peru and apparently his post-win celebration got a little out of control.
Sanchez was arrested early Monday morning when he refused to leave his Chicago hotel after being asked to leave following noise complaints. He was charged with criminal trespass and resisting arrest, both misdemeanors, and must return to Chicago in July for a court date.
Now I’m not a conspiracy theorist but Sanchez’s arrest came about nine hours after Sanchez had a run-in with Chicago Tribune soccer writer Luis Arroyave. Sanchez apparently made fun of Arroyave’s less than perfect Spanish, which angered Arroyave. Next thing you know, Sanchez is in jail. Coincidence? (for those of you slow to catch on, I’m kidding).
It seems like people who are for it being offside are only focusing on the penalizing a player for intentionally trying to put a player in an offside position by stepping off the field (11.10). He obviously wasn’t penalized, but the second law (11.11) says he is off the pitch and must still be considered when making an offside line. If you look at the laws in the opposite order, 11.11 says if the man is outside the playing field he must be considered as part of the offside line (whether he traveled outside intentionally or not) if, however, it is determined that he did it to specifically put a player in an offside position, 11.10 says the play will continue and the defender outside the field will get a card. I think the ref thought Panucci was down trying to get a foul called or a stoppage of play not to pull RVN offside (especially because Panucci stopped looking so wouldn’t know if anyone was on or not) so Panucci didn’t get a card but the play continued as 11.11 states it should.
Homey you ignorant slut, you are quoting an article from an American reporter who couldn’t even get an interview with the referee to explain himself. He did the same thing you and I did. Do the research yourself and tell me where you find Law 11.11 on the FIFA Laws of the Game website. If you are going to believe a reporter on this one, I would choose to believe the German national coach who was surprised by that interpretation. Choose your poison. The ref could have called it offsides and Taylor would have backed him up.
Hey HomeyBoehme:
If in your extensive research you’ve run across any section in the Laws of the Game any rule mentions this situation, I’d be impressed. It’s not there. That’s why I wrotes that it’s not clear in the Laws of the Game.
You’re very Ruud
Ok Enough! Fist off, If Pannuci steped out on purpose, then yes the goal is good and thus Pannuci recieving a Yellow Card. NO SUCH CARD WAS ISSUED!!!! therfore Pannuci was considered out of play BY the referee and THUS rendering the goal OFFSIDE!!!!
RULES ARE RULES!!!!
CAPICI!?!
For all the idiots (WWJfergusonD, and JMR) who don’t actually want to do any research on this here is an article about a MATCH IN GERMANY where a GERMAN REFEREE who made the call talked about a very similar situation:
Scroll down to the end of the article – Heading “A couple of important year-end housecleaning items” – Talks about a Dortmond game: http://msn.foxsports.com/other/story/836432/DEUTSCH:-The-2002-Year-in-review
It is not like this is the first time in the history of the universe this has happened. And if the referee had determined that Panucci had suffered a serious injury, he would have blown for a stoppage. The referee correctly determined Panucci was not injured and should have been trying to get back on the field, which means he counted as an eligible player leaving RVNisterlroy onside.
That is all.
To say “it’s clear within the laws” is a big mistake. FIFA’s Laws of the Game only talk about a defender “deliberately” leaving the pitch.
The interpretation being quoted is from the United States Soccer Federation. I don’t think the USSF has any jurisdiction in Euro 2008. I have not seen anything from FIFA (or UEFA) about its interpretations of the laws.
Alexandre,
Thank you for the fine words. In response to your,…errrr thoughts, if thats what you call them:
I suppose David Beckham was never going to play in MLS either? What is wrong with thinking big? I’m sure his Greek club would entertain transfering him at their price.
As far as Ochoa is concerned,…really. Let me get this straight,…you are using the word “great” and a Mexican keeper in the same sentence? We shall see.
By the way Alex,…you seem to be a real class act. All the best.
The Laws of the Game are clear as mud in regards to this play. Those quoting the advice have to realize that it is advice, not a law and is actually from USSF, not FIFA. Under Law 11 on the FIFA website you will only find this:
“If a defending player steps behind his own goal line in order to place
an opponent in an offside position, the referee shall allow play to
continue and caution the defender for deliberately leaving the field
of play without the referee’s permission when the ball is next out of
play.”
So Hudsonland can be correct in his assertion that if the ref should penalize a player he thinks left the field to place an opponent in an offsides position, and the ref didn’t do it than there is a logical implication that a defender out of bounds can place an attacker offsides.
Taylor can speak out of both sides of his mouth on this.
Clear as mud I say.
I’m surprised the announcers weren’t all over this. I was watching the game with my dad and stated right away that there was a defender that had fallen. The fact that it took them almost the whole game to figure this out was ridiculous. I also found it ironic that the announcer said it was one of the worst decisions ever, when in fact if it had been called the other way it could have been one of the worst decisions ever.
Agreed. It was definitely a goal. You could even see the ref and linesman take their time before making their call (with Van Nistalroy helping out by pointing to the guy down).
Loved that ESPN studio guys never even mentioned the down player in the half time show.
Nor did anyone mention how awful a play it was by Buffon. He was well past the post and easily could have slapped the ball over the line. Instead he laid a soft ball into the middle of the box for a Dutch guy to tie off on.
He makes the right play and their is no goal.
@Everyone – Here are a few other examples of this happening in the past –
Scroll down to the end of the article – Heading “A couple of important year-end housecleaning items” – Talks about a Dortmond game: http://msn.foxsports.com/other/story/836432/DEUTSCH:-The-2002-Year-in-review
See page 24 – rules 11.10 and 11.11:
http://www.ssjysl.org/docs/advice.pdf
Look for the heading “Defender off the field of play”:
http://www.askasoccerreferee.com/?m=200503
brian k,
ur an idiot and don’t know a thing about soccer. There is no way Nery is going to MLS and Guillermo Ochoa is a great goalkeeper while only 22 years old.
How could you blame Panucci for getting nailed by Buffon? That’s ridiculous.
I also don’t think you can say that the rule is clear. The rule quoted on ESPN yesterday says that the player who is off the field has to get there intentionally. I don’t think Panucci staying down intentionally to draw someone offside. I can see where this call is right, but I can (more easily) see where this call is wrong.
As for people who don’t trust ESPN’s soccer analysis, Andy Gray said the call was wrong. This wasn’t Eric Wynalda, Alexi Lalas or any other string of ESPN analysts.
The offside rule can be confusing. Yeah Netherlands were going to dominate either way. What was Oswaldo Sanchez thinking? I swear some players never cease to amaze me.
If you listen to Andy Gray (who has played more games than Tommy) you get a different viewpoint. Ruud was offside, he even thought so because he was looking for the ref to see if the flag was up before he celebrated.
Panucci did not deliberatly step off the field, but was hit his own goalkeeper.
kpugs:
You ask if FIFA would let USEFA back an incorrect call. I ask you when was the last time FIFA did not back a referee in a tournament.
Either way whether the call was correct or incorrect, Referees always miss calls in games, it is a fact of life. Sometimes these calls chnage the outcome of the game. Italy just has to put the call and game aside on concentrate on beating Romania on Fridayn and France on Tuesday. Do that and they are through to the Quaterfinals.
Regarding Sanchez; Couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy. 🙂
for all the people complaining about the difference between ‘forced out’ and ‘stepped out’ remember that he was forced out by his OWN PLAYER.
I am willing to make a compromise rule here. it’s offsides, but the out of bounds player is considered injured and cannot return to the pitch for the duration of the game.
An aspect nobody seems to be mentioning is that, while he did not leave the field intentionally, he certainly stayed off the field intentionally. He laid there, I guess hoping Holland would kick the ball out of bounds or something, and then as soon as the goal was scored, got right back up and started arguing and received no treatment, far as I can tell.
So if he intentionally is staying off the field and isn’t injured, then incorporate that into the advice section above and it’s clearly onside. If he had been attempting to get right back on the field, we might have an argument. I don’t really know how anyone can be that upset about it. As far as I’m concerned, it’s Panucci’s fault for being an idiot. They should be mad at him. But as someone said, there’s no accountability.
To make my position clear:
The rule doesn’t say that he was onside, but if it does, the rule is wrong.
Due to the completely untenable nature of this totally arbitrary position, I have no intention of embarrassing myself trying to defend it further.
Although for Ives to say ‘the rule is a clear one’ is a bit of a stretch.
I nominate Sanchez’s mug shot for the next “You Write the Caption.”
@Nick –
I had a similar thing happen as well. I stepped off the field to tie my shoe. The linesman told me to hurry up as I was giving the other team a good 20 yards behind the rest of the defenders who had pushed up the field.
@ People who trust ESPN for good information about soccer…WTF?!?! ESPN doesn’t know how to announce for soccer, they don’t know how to film soccer…but we will trust a panel of experts that are NOT referees and never have been to know all of the rules/rule interpretations in the game?
Donovan,
I agree with you and disagree.
They were under pressure and I am sure it was an appropriate time to feign injury. Kudos to the officials for letting the goal stand.
Tommy Smythe, you are brilliant! Julie Foudy….listen to man, he has seen more games in his lifetime than you.
Jah, clearly I was not offisde. Maybe, how you say, the Italians are cry baby? Jah, Italians are little cry baby. Hup Holland Hup!!!
-Ruud
You don’t magically disappear when you step off the field. This has happened to me before in a game where I was the one out of bounds and keeping people onside. In my case, I was backing up and tripped over an attacking player and ended up on the wrong side of the line in the net. The attacker, standing in front of the keeper, then deflected the ball into the net for a goal. He was the only person in the 6-yard box other than the keeper, but because I was in the goal, he was onside. The only way you are considered off the field is for treatment.
1. I’m not so quick to dismiss the Azzurri. Remember the opposition. The Dutch have often underwhelmed because they have so much individual and collective technical and tactical ability but never play as a team. Even a weak Dutch side is a great team–if they can get their collective act together. It was conventional wisdom to rate this current Dutch team to finish poorly. But one must admit that if Van Basten has the Oranje playing cohesively and aligned tactically than it’s a dangerous bunch for anyone. We’re so used to expecting the Dutch to underperform that we forget just how much talent is on that side: Nistelrooy, Robben, VDS, Von Bronckhorst, Van Der Vaart–by Dutch standards that isn’t great but for the rest of Europe it’s enough to win a European Championship with.
2. Yes, Sanchez has been part of the YNTC contest before but so has his evil twin Hugo. Ives, this picture just begs for a contest (especially given the context–the arrest, the hotel hystrionics). Please make it so!
Hudsonland,
At what point would a player no longer count towards offside? When he’s off getting treatment with the refs permission. It really isn’t complicated. And there was no UEFA post-rationalised whatsoever. None. The rules are what they are and Ruud was not in an offside position according to the rules. Not even close, as a matter of fact.
You say you would have complained more than the Italians, but I fail to understand exactly what you would have complained about. That the linesman failed to ignore the rules for the benefit of your team? Good luck with that one.
What a punk that Arroyave is! He should learn to speak English instead of getting my boy Sanchez arrested!
Where is that quoted rule coming from? What I found (at http://www.fifa.com/mm/document/affederation/federation/laws_of_the_game_0708_10565.pdf) was
“If a defending player steps behind his own goal line [Panucci did not step behind the goal line, he was forced out] in order to place
an opponent in an offside position [which implies that being legitimately over the goal line would put Ruud offside], the referee shall allow play to
continue and caution the defender for deliberately leaving the field
of play without the referee’s permission when the ball is next out of
play.”
There’s a logical implication there the defender being out of bounds does place an attacker offside, unless it was done deliberately.
Now I’m willing to accept that somewhere there is a rule that clearly and explicitly covers this situation and says that the attacker is onside, but if that is the case then it’s really against the spirit of the offsides law.
Hudsonland, a rule’s a rule. You can’t just make up a rule because you wish Italy got spanked 2-0 instead of 3-0. Jeez. Maybe you should bust out the FIFA rule book if you’re so sure you’re right. Do you honestly think FIFA would let UEFA get away with backing this rule if it wasn’t so obvious to everyone who knows anything about the game?
You always find the best pictures of Sanchez.
Donadoni was clear about the fact that his team did not play as well as it should have after the goal was allowed. So there is no question of who should have won that game.
The discussion here is that the linesman made a bad call and is hiding behind an “ADVICE” which contains 2 different references. unlike Ruud, Panucci did not attempt to gain an advantage, he was clearly knocked out of bounds and NEVER ONCE glanced back at the field of play. He was a non factor and the Linesman should have considered him as such.
Love all the Italian fans coming out of the woodwork still trying to say the first goal was offside. (Not necessarily on this site, but elsewhere.)
Maybe someone should see if a former ref could make it as a play by play announcer? It would certainly help in situations like this.
At what point does Panucci no longer count towards offside? If his leg was broken? If he was receiving treatment? At the point of brain-death?
The linesman botched the call and then UEFA post-rationalised it by using Panucci as an excuse.
Still, officials make mistakes, it’s part of the game. The Italians actually complained a lot less than I would have done.
This is just one of those really rare occurrences. Obviously the rule states the goal should stand. The question really becomes about whether the rule is good or not. At first thought I said t myself, that rule needs to be changed but you know what? It doesn’t. All of it makes sense and it is just really rare you will see something like that happen. It’s probably a big Karma turnaround for Italy for flopping a lot.
I’m sorry, but I can’t believe it is controversial. Of course there was no offside. If Punncci could create offside by existing the field, then defenders would do it all the time…conveniently “stumbling” across the end line at the right moment.
And to Mario above: I don’t see anything about “intentional”. He was carried out of the play by his own keeper. If he was shoved by the Dutch then that would be a foul and the play would have ended right there. Hell, i was rooting for Italy, I was unhappy about the goal. But there was never a doubt in my mind that the ref was correct.
The above quote from Advice to Referees 11.11 may be correct but the words were not what was presented on the ESPN2 wrap up show. They showed a quote that had the words “deliberetely leaves” the field of play.
There must be more information contained in this Advice 11.11, I would doubt ESPN2 is making it up.
A few pundits still maintain he was offside and have said, “if that’s a rule, then it should be changed, it’s a farce.”
Well…maybe. But it’s a rule currently and they can’t be selectively enforced.
Dominic Raynor is doing his chat and was adamant about the call being in error. I can’t agree with him.
Mario, I think one would argue that he did step off intentionally as he and a Dutch player were travelling forward and eventually out of bounds. His intention was to mark the player until he was no longer a threat, and his momentum took him out of bounds. What he didn’t intend on was being hit by his keeper knocking him to the ground and keeping him out of bounds. So, yes, he did mean to go out of bounds as the player he was marking was going out of bounds too, but he didn’t plan on getting hit by his own keeper and kept out of bounds. My question is this: Would there be the same uproar if it Panucci had been knocked to the ground inbounds? It seems the same situation, he gets knocked down and can’t immediately get back up, but he just happened to be out of bounds when he was hit.
The fact is that the Italian press will use this as an excuse for their team’s poor play. See, it was actually the refs bias that did the Italians in and not the fact that the Dutch took them out behind the woodshed and put a whuppin’ on them as we would say in Alabama. It was the same thing when they lost in Euro 2004 where it was a Scandinavian match fixing conspiracy between Denmark and Norway, and in World Cup 2002 where the South Koreans won by playing dirty. There’s never any accountability in Italian soccer, it is always someone else’s fault.
Mario,
that is a different element to the rule re. punishing players for going out of bounds. It a player goes out intentionally without permission from the ref he can be given a yellow card. In actually determing whether he is offside or not it doesn’t matter what the intent is.
RiceCloudnine dug this up yesterday during the game. I assume it’s quoted correctly.
From Advice to Referees 11.11:
“A defender who leaves the field during the course of play and does not immediately return must still be considered in determining where the second to last defender is for the purpose of judging which attackers are in an offside position. Such a defender is considered to be on the touch line or goal line closest to his or her off-field position. A defender who leaves the field with the referee’s permission (and who thus requires the referee’s permission to return) is not included in determining offside position.”
Thus, no offside.
re-post:
From Advice to Referees 11.11:
“A defender who leaves the field during the course of play and does not immediately return must still be considered in determining where the second to last defender is for the purpose of judging which attackers are in an offside position. Such a defender is considered to be on the touch line or goal line closest to his or her off-field position. A defender who leaves the field with the referee’s permission (and who thus requires the referee’s permission to return) is not included in determining offside position.”
It was a little surprising to hear so many “professionals” animately calling it offsides. I’m sure my Italian friends are still calling it offsides, ha.
Last night’s EURO wrap up show on ESPN2 quoted the rules and the directives issued by FIFA. The player out of bounds must have stepped off intentionally, which he cleraly did not. Van Nistleroy was offsides period.
Ives, the article you linked has quotes from UEFA officials who talk about the rules interpretation but never quote the actual rule itself.
While the Netherlands did play a good game, we all know what the first goal means in an evenly matched game. Lets face it no one would have cared about the offsides if it had been the third or even second goal scored.
Indy, it already was a YWTC, but on the old version of Soccer By Ives:
http://njmg.typepad.com/sbi/2007/09/you-write-the-c.html
Sanchez should have been arrested for impersonating a GK. I always laugh when Mexican supporters go on about Mexico being a world power. While El Tri roll out some very classy field players (would MLS please sign Neri Castillo at whatever cost),…their ‘keepers are laughable and almost certainly rule them out of contention for that rarest of air. And when it comes to the battle for CONCACAF supremacy,…the USA has an absolutely MASSIVE advantage over Mexico between the pipes. Keller, Friedel, Meola, Howard, Hanneman, etc. as opposed to Sanchez, Jorge Campos (Clown Suit Boy), etc., etc. And the real laugh is,…if these guys are the best they can get for the national team,…can you imagine what the other keepers are like in the Mexican League?
Ives this has to be a “you write the caption” Sanchez is such a baby. Brings back memories of him blowing kisses at Landy cakes in the Gold Cup last year before he buried that PK past him.
Ives, thank-you for being one of the only soccer writers to actually understand the rule & state that the ref & linesman were right on Holland’s 1st goal. I wasn’t surprised that so many fans didn’t understand the rule, but the number of announcers, experts & writers who continue to get it wrong is astounding.
Personally, while this looked like a situation where offsides should have come into play, if it would have been called offsides, it would ruin the game that we love. First of all, Panucci was hit by his own keeper. all you would have to do in a sticky situation is fall down off the field. We all know the Italians have a history over acting on being touched and they have made diving an art form. Can you imagine this new defensive tactic? While I don’t believe that is what happened here, it opens up the door for it.
i’d expect nothing less from dirty sanchez