by coyrls »
12 Aug 2010 10:44
TBM but your diagram shows the ball going forward, towards the man who is offside - on Saturday the original pass was going about 12 yards behind the goalscorer intended for another player.
You don't get it do you. The intention of the player who passes the ball and the direction of the pass don't come in to it. The judgment is has the player in an offside position (and you can be in an offside position without committing an offside offence), gained advantage from being in that position? Given that the deflection off a defender does not constitute a new phase of play, if the deflection arrives at a player who was in an offside position at the time the original pass was made then that player gains an advantage by virtue of his offside position an offside offence has been committed.
So the only important fact is was the Scunthorpe player in an offiside position at the time of the original pass? The evidence posted from screenshots shows that he was not in an offisde position and therefore the referee was correct. One thing I would say is that it was a very tight decision and unless he consulted with his assistant referee, the referee was not in a position to make the call. Finally given the tightness of the decision there was no way that the decision could have been obvious to everybody in the stadium as some people here appear to believe.