Towards the end of last season, I received my first ever appointment as a Fourth Official. I must say I enjoyed it, operating the numbers board showing substitutes on and off and time left to play, together with the other duties.
This was at Aldershot Town’s delightful but small recreation ground and one of the Fourth Official’s duties, to supervise the replacement balls, kept me busy. The railway runs along one side of the ground and the road the other and at one time there were two balls on the railway line, two in the road and one stuck up a tree. I’m not sure what the health and safety police would have thought of the ball boy shinning up the tree to retrieve it.
Trying to keep the coaches inside the technical area was another area of effort but at least none of them tried to ‘bend my ear’ about the referee’s decisions as you so often see at matches these days. The guidelines for the Fourth Official say, ‘He assists the referee at all times’. There have however been queries about how far this should go. When Zidane was sent off in the last World Cup final, there were suggestions that the referee and his assistant had missed his head butt and the referee’s attention was only drawn to it by the Fourth Official. This was denied at the time but as the officials are all wired up these days it would have been easy to do and would it have been so wrong?
The position of Fourth Official is a relatively recent innovation and in some ways his duties are still evolving. At this years meeting of the International FA Board, the Scottish Football Association put forward a proposal to discuss the role and responsibilities of the Fourth Official. Quite what they had in mind I don’t know but it was deferred to be discussed at a special meeting of the Board on 17th – 18th May. As all changes to the Laws come into effect from the 1st June, anything agreed won’t affect this year’s World Cup.
One small change you might see at the World Cup stems from another proposal by the Scottish Football Association and relates to the treatment of players injured during the game. Many people find the ruling that a player has to leave the pitch after receiving treatment a little peculiar and there is to be one small amendment to this. If two players of the side collide and require treatment, they will now be allowed to remain on the field of play. The ruling is already in place that, if a player and a goalkeeper are injured in the same incident, neither has to leave after treatment.
The Scottish FA’s other proposal that, if a player’s injury was sustained as a result of an offence against him by an opponent,
he should be allowed to remain, was turned down but referred to the IFAB Technical sub-committee for further discussion.
The FIFA proposal to discuss the punishment for denying an obvious goal-scoring opportunity in the penalty area was also deferred to a later time, so we can all sit down and watch this World Cup knowing that there will not be any meaningful changes to the Laws.
The increased distribution of getreading has meant that this column has many new readers. Many people have told me they have discovered it and express surprise when I tell them that it is actually in its tenth year, thanks to the
Reading Post. My thanks also to all those readers who have written, e-mailed, phoned or stopped me with queries about the laws. I am sorry I haven’t been able to include them all but I have kept a list of them for possible future columns, perhaps next season.
In the meantime enjoy the World Cup
Dick Sawdon Smith
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