Attention: Please take a moment to consider our terms and conditions before posting.

The way injury time is played.....

With the post about 6 minutes stoppage and that being the time addes last night it renews my thoughts for the way games are timed. For a while now I have believed instead of having a minimum of 'X' minutes added time I can see no reason what so ever why football can't see why football can't be timed the same way as a rugby match. No I don't mean making it 80 minutes. I mean having should minimum of 'X' minutes should be scrapped for having a clock that stops everytime the ball goes dead and when the clock strikes 45 minutes or 90 minutes (or 105 minutes or 120 minutes in the event of extra time) thats when the game ends. All someone has to od is put the ball out of play and thats is when the game is over. It would save a lot of confusuion. We had he confusion with Reading v Arsenal just last week when the ref played 2 minutes more than was advertised and we had it a Manchester derby 2 or 3 years ago when Michael Owen scored a very late winner for United well over a minute after the advertised time and we never heard the end of it from City for. I feel it's worth giving the rugby style a whirl.

Comments

  • edited November 2012
    There is no reason other than tradition. If you did introduce a seperate time keeper you couldn't play 90 minutes - games would go on too long. You'd probably have to go with 70 mins - possibly 60 (which would still give us more action). But that would be a fundamental change and football is not a sport that likes to make those.

    The ref can't accurately time matches and do all the other things he has to do. it is understandable they get caught up in the occasion sometimes. No doubt yesterday's ref will get in trouble with the assesor as the 6 mins wasn't justifiable. I wasn't too bothered at the time as I was enjoying the match and thought we might get another but it does highlight a problem that ought to be looked at but won't be.
  • I don't think it would work. Every now and then there is an argument but in general it works fine IMO
  • Why do players waste time? the answer is simple. Because it works! The ref never adds as much time as they have wasted. Having a seperate time keeper would make time wasting futile which could make a big improvement to the game in general.
  • I was too engrossed in the game last night to say with any real confidence how much time ought to have been added. However, I was staggered when the fourth official said a minimum of six minutes.

    We all see a lot of matches and it's nearly always 3 or 4 minutes whatever seems to have happened. Had Cardiff equalised I suspect Chris Powell and his staff would have needed all their powers of restraint to avoid a major confrontation.

    I suspect it could have got very ugly.
  • Why do players waste time? the answer is simple. Because it works! The ref never adds as much time as they have wasted. Having a seperate time keeper would make time wasting futile which could make a big improvement to the game in general.

    But then I don't think anyone thinks that a 90 minute of football should contain 90 minutes of actual in play action, as otherwise each game would go on for ever, if you stopped the clock whenever a freekick or corner was awarded. I've never timed it, but next time I watch rugby, it'll be interesting to time each 40 minute half to see how long they actually last for.
  • Why do players waste time? the answer is simple. Because it works! The ref never adds as much time as they have wasted. Having a seperate time keeper would make time wasting futile which could make a big improvement to the game in general.

    But then I don't think anyone thinks that a 90 minute of football should contain 90 minutes of actual in play action, as otherwise each game would go on for ever, if you stopped the clock whenever a freekick or corner was awarded. I've never timed it, but next time I watch rugby, it'll be interesting to time each 40 minute half to see how long they actually last for.
    Rugby matches last a good 15-20 minutes longer than the notional 80 in general.
  • Lot of standing around and talking in Rugby whereas football is always on the go save for injuries so always much easier to stop the clock in Rugby. Wouldn't work in football.
  • edited November 2012
    It is all about making it more transparent. Currently either the ref or the 4th official 'stops" his watch for a certain amount of time for certain incidents. But we don't know in each case for how long.

    All that is needed is that this stopwatch is connected up to a big screen clock so we can see that the ref has stopped his watch. It really is that simple.
  • Studies have been done into this plenty of times. Ball is in play for around 60 minutes, typically just over. So it should be simple, 2x30 minutes, 4th (or 5th) official stops the clock whenever the ball isn't in play. Game would last a similar time to it does now, the ball would be in play for a similar amount of time, you'd just eradicate time wasting, and makes fans a lot happier (and Fergie a lot sadder)
  • Always been confused by this.

    To be accurate, the ref should stop his watch every time he feels necessary like Prague says (which shouldn't be too often as the reason games are 90 minutes is to allow for much of the out-of-play action).

    With that in mind, 'injury time' doesn't really exist. So how does he know what the difference should be between his watch and the TV clock? And why is injury time nearly always an exact number?

    Clearly they don't do it the way they should/ used to. Which means the whole timekeeping thing is a grey area. Which seems nuts to me. How can such an important aspect of the game be so debatable when it's simple maths? The only time a ref should keep a game going beyond time is fr a penatly, that's a rule in the sport. Yet they keep it going until an attack has finished, or sometimes until a 'Keeper has taken a goal kick. It ain't right!
  • Sponsored links:


  • Studies have been done into this plenty of times. Ball is in play for around 60 minutes, typically just over. So it should be simple, 2x30 minutes, 4th (or 5th) official stops the clock whenever the ball isn't in play. Game would last a similar time to it does now, the ball would be in play for a similar amount of time, you'd just eradicate time wasting, and makes fans a lot happier (and Fergie a lot sadder)

    This ^^. All this crap about "It wouldn't work in football" is rubbish. It would just require change.

  • The ball goes out for a corner. The centre backs lumber up the pitch, while the corner taker walks over to retrieve the ball. As he's about to take it the referee blows his whistle and runs over to break up some pushing in the box.

    Is this 'wasted' time part of the 90, or time that should be added on? Or is only part of it added on (e.g. the ref stopping the pushing)?
  • It would work brilliantly - and would have a positive effect on the game unless anybody thinks time wasting is attarctive on the eye.

    Currently the ref goes with a gut feeling on how much added time to play - yes, if there is a major incident he'll stop his watch, but for the most part I can predict the amount of time that will be added. Not because it is right but just because I watch enough games to get a feel for what refs do.

    I think the ref played 6 minutes last night because he got a bit carried away in what was a terrific game. He was a bit inept - so many bookings in what was a very clean game!!!!
  • I think some of the confusion arises with the TV companies putting up '2 minutes added time' . This is only ever an indication, it's not set in stone.

    If you listen to BDL's announcements at the Valley, he always says 'the 4th official has indicated, that there will be a minimum of ..... which I beleive is the official line.

    At other grounds I've heard them announce 'there will be 3 minutes extra time'. It's not extra time at all.

    Only the referee will know how much time he's going to add. And as somebody pointed out earlier it's not added time, it's made up of the stoppages.

  • I do remember when we played Hull City at the Valley in 2008/9 they took time wasting to a new level. After doing this for the first half and making the game really slow and boring my son decided to spend the second half timing how long the ball was in play, but without stopping the clock for throw-ins - it was about 18 minutes. I seem to remember in one major tournament they showed an on screen statistic afetr every game of how long teh ball hasd been in play and it was generally about an hour
  • edited November 2012

    I think some of the confusion arises with the TV companies putting up '2 minutes added time' . This is only ever an indication, it's not set in stone.

    If you listen to BDL's announcements at the Valley, he always says 'the 4th official has indicated, that there will be a minimum of ..... which I beleive is the official line.

    At other grounds I've heard them announce 'there will be 3 minutes extra time'. It's not extra time at all.

    Only the referee will know how much time he's going to add. And as somebody pointed out earlier it's not added time, it's made up of the stoppages.

    Yes but if they have held up a board saying 4 minutes, it should only be more than 4 minutes if something else happens in that 4 minutes to warrant further time added on, such as a sub, right? Otherwise it should be exactly 4.00 and not 4.08 because the ref feels like seeing what comes of this last attack.

  • I think some of the confusion arises with the TV companies putting up '2 minutes added time' . This is only ever an indication, it's not set in stone.

    If you listen to BDL's announcements at the Valley, he always says 'the 4th official has indicated, that there will be a minimum of ..... which I beleive is the official line.

    At other grounds I've heard them announce 'there will be 3 minutes extra time'. It's not extra time at all.

    Only the referee will know how much time he's going to add. And as somebody pointed out earlier it's not added time, it's made up of the stoppages.

    Yes but if they have held up a board saying 4 minutes, it should only be more than 4 minutes if something else happens in that 4 minutes to warrant further time added on, such as a sub, right? Otherwise it should be exactly 4.00 and not 4.08 because the ref feels like seeing what comes of this last attack.

    Yes, absolutely. But referees are only human....allegedly.
  • I think some of the confusion arises with the TV companies putting up '2 minutes added time' . This is only ever an indication, it's not set in stone.

    If you listen to BDL's announcements at the Valley, he always says 'the 4th official has indicated, that there will be a minimum of ..... which I beleive is the official line.

    At other grounds I've heard them announce 'there will be 3 minutes extra time'. It's not extra time at all.

    Only the referee will know how much time he's going to add. And as somebody pointed out earlier it's not added time, it's made up of the stoppages.

    Yes but if they have held up a board saying 4 minutes, it should only be more than 4 minutes if something else happens in that 4 minutes to warrant further time added on, such as a sub, right? Otherwise it should be exactly 4.00 and not 4.08 because the ref feels like seeing what comes of this last attack.

    Yes, absolutely. But referees are only human....allegedly.
    Sure. But overall I am for max use of technology to reduce the room for human error, and with it, the room for abuse of the human beings who do this work. I go to ice hockey here and there is nothing like the negative focus on the officials that you get in footie.

  • Yep, agree.
    Putting the board up at 90 minutes compounds the issue. People will never agree on the time, or how much extra time is needed, or played.

    Either have a clock and timekeeper like in other sports, or don't put the board up.

    I'm sure we got by before these announcements were made.
  • But if the ref intends to add 4 mins and 25 seconds he has to give a number, so they round it down and then announce it will be a minimum of 4 minutes.

    They add 30 seconds for each substitution and 30 seconds for each goal, I believe. They can also add time wasting on to the injury time.

    the current system is better than what we used to have, when they didn't even tell us how much injury time they were going to add.
Sign In or Register to comment.

Roland Out Forever!