The Torres goal should make you rethink the DOGSO . . .

    The exciting match between a depleted Chelsea and a Barcelona team determined to assert their supremacy in their own home, ended in high drama.  Barcelona wanted to be the first team to repeat as European champions, but could not break down the top-of-the-penalty-area resistance, the manning of the castle walls by the surviving ten players.  Then this happened: A pass did not find its target, and a defender wellied the ball upfield to a lone player who had drifted towards the halfway line.  With a delicate first touch, Fernando Torres controlled the ball and was over the midfield stripe ten yards before the nearest opponent started chasing him.  See it at http://youtu.be/yd9UeNsdZCo?hd=1.

    What riveted me to the scene as Torres took off on his sixty-yard run, with the ball fully under his control for fifty-five of them, was the realization that he was almost certainly going to score.  No one could catch him, the goalkeeper was late to react (but in any case was condemned to solitary confinement in his penalty-area), and all the Chelsea striker had to do was round Victor Valdez and tap the ball in the net.  What I have described, you may notice, is an obvious goal-scoring opportunity, and obvious at fifty-five yards from the goal.

    Yet in the ancillary advice (four items or the "Four Dees") pitched to referees to help them understand when to penalize the denial of an obvious goal-scoring opportunity is a warning about distance, distance from the goal, that is, where the foul is committed that takes the striker's opportunity away.  Too far upfield from the goal, the advice says, and you must not send off the defender.  But how far is too far?

Torres' run for goal.

    The commentator, former Manchester United and England full-back Gary Neville, knew as soon as Torres took off with the ball at his feet that a big event was coming, and said so.  Then when the ball ended up in the net, he celebrated it with a strange moaning sound that most people would be glad to hear in a bedroom, though perhaps not in a stadium with more than ninety-five thousand voyeurs.  In this case, a foul that stops Torres anywhere along this marvellous run would have been denying him an obvious goal-scoring opportunity, would it not?

    But wait!  There's more!  Take a look at this closer view as Torres approaches the top of the penalty-area and is challenged by the goalkeeper:

 

    Valdez approaches, is deceived by Torres' body-swerve and goes to ground, scrambling to his left hoping to make contact with the ball.  Notice the direction of the striker's path.  Is he going towards the goal?

    From C to D to E, he appears to be heading off towards the corner of the goal-area, but his general direction has been towards the goal, ever since he sprinted across the halfway line in the breakaway.  Not only that, but every one of his positions shown in the drawing is closer to the goal than is the previous one.  He is indeed heading towards the goal and with the ball under control.  And if Valdez had taken him down, Torres would have been denied an obvious goal-scoring opportunity, for which there is only one punishment allowed in the laws.  A second of the Four Dees is not always correct.

    So don't flinch if your soccer instincts whisper DOOGSO in your ear.  Do your duty, and the game will be the better for it.

Comments

[Jim Gilbert]

Impressed with the fitness of the referee who was deep at the other end but caught up after the long lead pass and was already at the top of the other PA when the shot was taken.
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Jim: Ed and I have been trying to convince referees that going deep at one end does not mean that you neglect the other. It's all about your fitness, and fitness is not difficult to obtain. Cheers, Bob.

[Alberto]

Fitness is not the sole factor in determining the quality of a referee. In many respects it is one of the least important. Match/man management is the most important. Followed by foul recognition.
[ . . . removed as offensive . . .] that teaching point that if you are close to the play you can sell the call. How about improving foul recognition?
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We did not suggest that fitness is the sole factor, but it is an essential one. (And the easiest to gain.) Many referees say that they are applying "man management", when in reality all they are doing is turning away from making a tough decision As an aside, if you make ad hominem insults in comments in the future, you will not be allowed to publish on this site. RE.

[Gil Weber]

Bob, I agree that here in the US our referee instructional system has burned all four "Ds" as absolutes into referees' minds. While distance to the ball and number of defenders seems pretty straight-forward, certainly distance to goal and direction are not. The Torres goal demonstrates that at least for those two "Ds" a bit of common sense and experience needs to be applied.

I remember watching a game maybe eight or nine years ago with Gabriel Batistuta playing for Fiorentina. He dribbled the ball into the opponent's penalty area far to the goalkeeper's left, and heading toward the goal line but certainly not toward the space between the goal posts. The GK came out to challenge, missed the ball, and put Batistuta off balance.

Batistuta managed to hurdle the bad challenge, kept his feet, and caught up to the ball very close to the goal line (still not moving at the space between the goal posts). From a position out toward the edge of the penalty area and near the goal line (meaning practically an impossible angle) he managed to put the ball into the net. It was a goal of sublime skill from an enormously talented player.

Now, had the GK's challenge flattened Batistuta would that have been DOGSO-F? In this case Batistuta's skill demonstrated that despite the direction not being toward the space between the goal posts it was for him a goal scoring opportunity, and had he been flattened the GK should have been sent off.

Yet had the same scenario developed in a game that most referees here officiate, and had the attacker gone down, would a foul so far out on the periphery of the penalty area, with the attacker moving at the goal line but certainly not toward the goal, would that have been DOGSO-F?

Probably not.

In evaluating DOGSO-F I suggest the wise referee should add a qualifying "S" to the "Ds" -- the skill level of the players. The direction and distance to goal need to be considered not as absolutes (for example, not always requiring heading to the space between the goal posts) but, rather, judged in light of what those players seem capable of given their skill level.

Of course that becomes very subjective -- something learned with experience and impossible to teach in a classroom. But then isn't so much of refereeing subjective -- IITOOTR?

Gil Weber
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Exactly! Cheers, RE

[Brian Smith-White]

Another example of "going at the goal" failing as a definitive criterion from an EPL match within the last two weeks. The defender is tracking the attacker from the 18 to the 6 (or maybe a step closer to the goal line). The path of the two is toward the goal line, slightly away from the goal mouth. The attacker continues one step more toward the goal line and pfft (a shot across the goal mouth at the far post). The ball goes past the near post, past the keeper and into the net on the other side of the goal mouth. The attacker's forward motion takes them across the goal line between the near post and the intersection of the goal line and the 6 yard line. Clearly not moving at the goal. If the defender had dumped the attacker rather than failing to follow - would that have been DOGSO? Clearly not as 'obvious' as the Torres example. But about as obvious as Gil's example.

BSW