If like me you struggle at this time of the year, when asked by family members what you’d like for Christmas, here’s a little suggestion. A couple of months ago I came across, in a National Trust bookshop of all places, a delightful little book entitled ‘Dugouts’, written by a self-confessed football anorak, David Bauckham.
Not that there is a great deal of writing, mainly the book consists of photos of dugouts from non-league clubs throughout the country. These are the sort of clubs where I spent much of my early refereeing career, indeed Abingdon Town where I refereed many times is one of those whose dugout is included, adorned with potted plants in need of watering. Forget the top teams where some have luxury heated seating and closed circuit television in their dugouts, these clubs are run on a shoe-string, so many of their dugouts have been built by the club members themselves.
In the Laws of the Game there is no direct mention or advice on dugouts but they belong in what is now called
'the technical area'. Some in the book are even portable, being wheeled out for every home game. St Andrews FC who play in the Anglian League in Norfolk have wonderfully idiosyncratic wheeled dugouts that are separated by a tiny portable wooden stand, which really has to be seen to be believed. Another one which specially caught my eye was at Haverhill Rovers in Suffolk. The simple brick built dugouts are not large enough to house anyone more that the coach and trainer, so alongside, all contained within the carefully marked out technical areas, are two long park benches, one for either side, their seating for the substitutes.
If the lower echelons of the game ever feel that they have to keep up with the leagues at the top, it seems to me that a few more will have to follow St Andrews ingenious solution to accommodate the extra substitutes. I suppose it hasn’t been unnoticed by fans of the professional game that the announcement giving out the names of the two competing teams before the game, now takes a little longer. This is because the Premier and Football Leagues changed the ruling on substitutes this season. This is not a change in the Laws of the Game but merely a change of competition rules.
When substitutes were first introduced for matches in a competition (as opposed to friendlies) at the beginning of the 1960s, just two substitutes could play and it was of course only for players who were injured. This was soon forgotten and the stipulation was that two substitutes could be used out of five named substitutes. This remained the case until 1995, when the number of substitutes allowed to play was increased to three and the following year, the number of substitutes that could be nominated was increased to seven. What the Law actually says is ‘Up to three substitutes may be used in any match played in any official competition. The rules of the competition must state how many substitutes may be nominated, from three up to a maximum of seven.’ So only three can play but within those restrictions it is up to the competitions themselves to fix the number that can sit on the bench. Although they could have had seven from 1996 most British competitions have stuck to the original five, until now.
Sir Alex Ferguson was amongst those campaigning for an increase in the Premier League saying that in the Champions League he has been able to name seven but had revert to five for Premier League matches. This has obviously spread to the Football League as well but how much farther down the leagues it will go is debateable. Firstly, they may struggle to find the extra players and secondly, will they have room in the dugout?
Dick Sawdon Smith
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