How to .... run a line

Some of you will be doing your first line duty this season. Here are a couple of things to keep in mind.

1. The ball is out when the whole of the ball crosses the whole of the line.

2. If you see a handball or foul you should flag wildly to the ref. Those guys are often blind and will have missed the infringement, but are usually able to hear a flapping flag.

3. Hard as it is to face lining a 3pm game (having played at 1pm) without a beer in hand, it is against the laws of the comp. Perhaps pour it into a sports drink bottle first.

4. Try keep up with play. It makes offside calls easier but also allows you to see if the ball has crossed the goallines.

5. Defenders, like suffers of Tourette's, will spit out "offside" at you all afternoon. It is therefore handy to know the rules. Offside is straightforward but not.
A player is offside if they have fewer than two opponents between them and the opposition goal when the ball is passed and they subsequently touch the ball or interfere with an opponent.

Have a look at the following explanation by the boss of the English referees, Keith Hackett.

"The law really is simple and well defined. First and foremost, it is important to know the key principle: it is not an offence in itself to be in an offside position. Assistants will not flag the moment someone strays offside. A player is only penalised if he then becomes active.
The source of most confusion is clearly in the definition of 'active'.

To be clear, the definition, in the laws, is this: in deciding whether to flag, assistants must watch out for three things, any one of which would make an offside player active.
First, is the offside player interfering with play? That means playing or touching the ball. Attempting to play the ball does not count - he must actually play or touch it.

Second, is the player interfering with an opponent's ability to play the ball, by clearly obstructing the opponent's line of vision or movements, or by making a gesture or movement which, in the opinion of the referee, deceives or distracts an opponent?

And third, is the player 'gaining an advantage'? This last point is specific. It applies only to an offside player playing a ball that rebounds to him from an opponent, the post or the crossbar. If he does not play the ball from the rebound, then he is not penalised for being in that offside position. Nothing else counts as 'gaining'.

And that's it. If a player ticks any one of those three boxes, he is offside. The three-part definition is remembered as 'PIG' - if a player doesn't Play, Interfere or Gain, he is fine."