Question:
Situation in a adult league game.
Attacking team has one player (A1) in an offside position. At the first look it does not look like the player will be involved in the game, the AR1 waits with the signal.
CR looks at him, sees no signal, play goes on. Player A1 goes for the ball and gets it , AR1 raises the flag CR does not see it. Ball gets directly from A1 taken away by a player of team B.
Team B takes the ball up and runs up the field. AR remains in “flag up” position, as according to him the player A1 was clearly offside and involved.
AR2 raises his flag also (mirroring the other AR). CR does not react to the signal, as attacking team B goes ahead and scores.
After the scoring of team B, CR “asks” AR 2, which points to AR 1. CR talks with AR 1, gets the information about the offside and decides the goal stands.
Reasoning ” If I had seen the signal I had waived you down anyway, the offside did end in an advantage for team B”.
Can you please let me know if CR reacted right or wrong? For anything else but the offside the situation had been clear, game was interrupted with the foul etc, no goal.
Can you please shed some more light?
USSF answer (October 7, 2008):
The referee’s action was correct, but the explanation was incorrect. The referee cannot apply advantage to an offside situation, but may certainly decide that there is no (longer) an offside situation — which was quite clear in this case after the transfer of possession of the ball to team B.
Furthermore, in the absence of specific instructions to the contrary in the pregame, the AR should have promptly dropped the flag the moment the ball was clearly controlled by the defenders.
