The booklet produced every year on the Laws of the Game, which we in the refereeing fraternity call LOAF (Laws Of Association Football), was until 1992 known as
The Referees’ Chart with the sub-title ‘Players Guide to the Laws of the
Game.
In fact up until 1982 it also contained ‘Advice to Players’ and under Law 12, Fouls and Misconduct, it had the following words of advice to any player who was on the receiving end of a shoulder charge. “Keep your temper and do not appear annoyed if you are charged. It is no disgrace to be bowled over by a fair charge; you will probably go over straight away if an opponent catches you standing on one foot. It will help you learn a valuable lesson. Let your own changes too, be fair and honest,”
I thought of this recently when watching Manchester United’s cup-tie with Portsmouth on television. There is no doubt that Cristiano Ronaldo, the talented Manchester player, got bowled over with a charge from Sylvain Distin while chasing a ball in the Portsmouth penalty area.
Ronaldo, is of course too young to have read that advice to players, even if it was ever translated into Portuguese, but I think I can fairly say that he got annoyed. And so did his boss Sir Alex Ferguson. The question is – was it a fair
charge? Referee Martin Atkinson obviously thought so, as he allowed play to continue.
The Laws of the Game are perhaps not as clear as they could be on this subject as they don’t describe what constitutes a fair charge. In times like this I turn to the referees’ ‘other’ book,
Advice on the Application of the Laws of the Game but this seems to ignore the subject altogether.
However, this year’s version of LOAF has, at the rear, a new list of ‘Additional Instructions to Referees, Assistant
Referees and Fourth Officials’, and here we find some illumination – or do we? It describes the act of charging as ‘a challenge for space using physical contact within playing distance of the ball without using arms or elbows’.
We can take it, however, from these Additional Instructions, that for it to be a fair charge, the player has to keep his arm and elbow down to his side which I think Distin did. It has always been understood that the charge should be ‘shoulder to shoulder’, a shoulder charge in the chest or in the back would be seen, at the very least, as dangerous to the opponent. Again I think the Portsmouth player complied.
There is another clue in the Additional Instructions, which say the ball has to be
'within playing distance'. Although it was some way in front of Ronaldo, I think he would have reached it before it went over the goal line so it could be said to be within his playing distance.
If we turn to the LOAF, what it actually says about charging is this. ‘A direct free kick is awarded if a player charges an opponent in a manner considered by the referee to be careless, reckless or using excessive force.’ I suppose everybody will have their own opinion as to whether that charge was any of those things. Ronaldo was bowled over but was that just because of the speed he was running and caught on one foot or, was it a reckless charge or made with excessive
force?
Sir Alex was in no doubt nor was his assistant Carlos Queiroz, who blamed the decision
for them losing the game, rather than their players’ failure to take any of their innumerable chances, including one glaring miss by Ronaldo. On the other hand, Portsmouth manager Harry Redknapp considered it a perfectly good charge. In the end, as the Law says, it’s ‘in the consideration of the referee’ who’s never going to please everyone.
Dick Sawdon Smith
Back
To Contents
© R Sawdon Smith 2008