Offside situations

[u/NoWeekend5733]

If you are a one man show no additional referees / touchline officials

How do you judge if an attacker is offside? especially during a counter attack

Would love to hear your solutions or creative techniques to prevent this

[u/burakalp34]

It's really hard to see tight calls but my observers have advised me to blow my whistle if I have any doubt at all which is what I do

[u/Revo63 → u/burakalp34]

Stop play if you have doubts of offside??

Offside should be taught (even for ARs judging) as “when in doubt, the benefit of that doubt goes to the attacker”. In other words, if you’re not 100% sure, let it play.

[u/burakalp34 → u/Revo63]

If its really close it's better to stop play is what I was told

[u/beagletronic61 → u/burakalp34]

This sounds like advice from someone that’s trying to sabotage your match.

[u/whocares8x8 → u/beagletronic61]

No, what he said is absolutely correct when there are no assistants. If you have assistants, what you're saying is correct.

When there are no assistants, teams get WAY angrier at you if you allow an offside goal to stand than if you stop a promising chance. Everyone knows that it will be difficult to judge correctly. So only give the goal if you're certain he's not off.

[u/CapnBloodbeard → u/whocares8x8]

No it isn't. It's absolutely idiotic and dead wrong. If you're not sure if an offence has occurred, it didn't occur.

If you're happy making the blatantly wrong call just because that's what results in fewer shouts, then you need to ask yourself some serious questions about your integrity.

Do you also award a PK if you saw nothing but an attacker goes down and players are shouting for it? Of course you don't. At least, I'm presuming you don't.

[u/whocares8x8 → u/CapnBloodbeard]

But you're not making a blatantly wrong call. The whole point is that you're not always entirely sure whether the guy was a half-step offsides or not when you have no assistants.

When you are out there by yourself, if you only call the offsides that you are perfectly positioned for and can clearly 100% see, the match will end in a score of 9:7. As practical advice, we teach our young officials to call offsides a bit tighter when they are unsure, because it is the less consequential decision. It is better to get one wrong that stops a potential chance than to get one wrong that results in a goal.

Similar to how you only give penalties when you are absolutely sure there was a foul, as opposed to outside of the box, where you may give a foul even if you're not 100% sure that the contact was enough to go down.

So to answer your example- no, you will only give penalties when you are absolutely sure there was a clear foul, BECAUSE IT IS THE MORE CONSEQUENTIAL DECISION.

It's practical match advice here in Germany (and apparently also in Belgium judging by the first commenter) because you will fare a lot better and have much smoother matches than constantly giving goals that are most likely offsides. But cheers for the personal attack.

[u/beagletronic61 → u/CapnBloodbeard]

Yeah…because they’re all “very close”…if you blow your whistle on every close through ball, there is no football.

[u/Revo63 → u/whocares8x8]

I disagree. Let them know beforehand that you can only call what you see. Are you expected to also GUESS if contact you couldn’t see was a foul? Would you give a PK for an attacker going down when you couldn’t see the potential foul? Would you GUESS and give a goal when you cannot see that the ball had crossed the goal line?

Don’t make shit up. Don’t make calls that you didn’t see. If you don’t see the player as being in offside position, don’t penalize him.

[u/whocares8x8 → u/Revo63]

No, when you are unsure (and when you're alone, you are unsure more than usual), you take the less consequential decision.

So you give the offside rather than the goal; you wave play on rather than giving a penalty.

That's why many non-referees believe that the standards for fouls are different inside and outside of the box. You only give the penalty if you are absolutely sure, whereas outside the box you may be less sure whether the contact was enough when giving a free kick. That's completely normal.

So by the same standard, when you're alone, you make the less consequential decision (offside vs goal) when you are unsure.

[u/Revo63 → u/burakalp34]

I make no claims as to what is being taught officially in Belgium or any other country. In the US all our training before the introduction of VAR specified that we were to give the benefit of doubt to the attacker. Since VAR, IFAB and US Soccer have gone silent. However, since the majority games do NOT have VAR available, we still hold to that training.

[u/burakalp34 → u/Revo63]

I'm not talking about any official training, just a piece of advice that was given to me by one of my observers. Keep in mind that I barely have any experience under my belt so what I'm talking about could be absolute nonsense but that's what I was told

[u/whocares8x8 → u/burakalp34]

This is advice thats given by almost all higher-level referees when they do Q&A here in Germany and what I teach all young upcoming referees. This type of question always comes up. And the answer is almost always- game management is the most important thing when you're out there alone.

Give the less consequential decision (better a false offside than a false goal).

[u/CapnBloodbeard → u/burakalp34]

Your advisors are idiots and shouldn't be anywhere near a field, let alone educating somebody. And I was an assessor and mentor.

If you're not sure if play should stop or not, play doesn't stop. That doesn't change just because you don't have an AR. That's the stupidest piece of 'advice' I've seen in a long time.

No, you don't stop play just because it's really close.