So what exactly did Minulette(sp? Sunderland go) get booked for? Did Phil Dowd just make up some sort of yellow card for deliberately handling a back pass? I've certainly never heard of any such rule, and even if the rule did exist its still incredibly harsh, its not as if he had any choice about handling it. Are we really at the stage where a keepers only choice is either concede a goal, or concede an indirect free kick in the box and take a yellow card.
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(unless I'm misunderstanding you)
I've often been curious as to why it isn't always enforced - it's also one thing I used to find annoying about some of Michael Morrison's back-passes to Hamer when he was under pressure. (He's got a lot better at that to be fair.)
Just never ever seen a keeper booked for it, especially one forced to save a wayward back pass. Often when the keeper has been forced to save the ball its not even given as a back pass.
A red card would be crazy and potentially result in teams hacking the ball randomly rather than risk anything beyond a simple back pass, which we don't want to see.
And of course there are different rules for keepers. They're the only ones allowed to deliberately handle the ball. That rule has been around for at least a couple of years now.
scenario 1 - shot comes in, defender saves with hand to prevent goal = penalty and red card
scenario 2 - bad backpass, keeper handles to prevent goal = indirect free kick and yellow card
Is this fair? Keepers get red carded for deliberate handball outside the area and IMO this is pretty much the same thing. Harsh on the keeper but he's getting punished for the defenders mistake.
If a defender does a bad backpass, the keeper handling it is doing it to prevent a goal. IMO the punishment for breaking a rule is unjust at the moment. Its just my opinion though, I can see why some will disagree.
Deliberate handball by an outfield player is never open to interpretation and the decision is based on what that individual player does. To interpret if a goalkeeper's deliberately handled the Ref has to decide the intention of another player not the keeper. I can't see how's it's fair judging a player based on the interpreted actions of another.
The rule's fine as it is and actually effects very few games, and is way down in the stupid rules list. Need to sort out the offside rule and the one with players having to go off after treatment first. These are every game occurances that influence games and rule changes that haven't worked as intended (imo).
Regarding bookings for back pass handling, the more things that become bookable offenses the more inconsistency we will see from referees. They are under pressure to not turn every game into an 8 v 9 farce, but if everything is potentially bookable then you'll see more and more players not getting booked for second offenses and rules being enforced based on something other than the wording of those rules.