The bronze-medal game at the 2012 Summer Olympics provided Canadian soccer fans with a moment they're likely never to forget: Diana Matheson's surprising, shocking and utterly exhilarating stoppage-time goal to clinch a podium spot for Big Red.
But what will likely be forgotten -- if it was ever known at all -- is how close that goal came to being disallowed. In fact, there are surely legions of French fans feeling as aggrieved about the non-call at the end of Thursday's match as Canadian fans were about THE CALL in Monday's semifinal.
So, do they have a point? Should Canada have been flagged for offside and had Matheson's goal negated?
[PRBREAK][/PRBREAK]
Sure, you spent all of Thursday watching this replay a thousand times, but what the hell, one more time won't hurt, to remind you of just what went down:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RsVcTjFpy3M
Now, it's not Matheson herself who's potentially offside (she's fine); it's Kaylyn Kyle (#6), who found her way into the France goal area a few moments before Matheson latched onto the shot. From 91:19 onward, Kyle is behind the second-last French player and is, indisputably, in an offside position.
Ah, but as Law 11 has taught us well, it's not about being in an offside position, it's about what you do while you're there. A player is only called for offside if "at the moment the ball touches or is played by one of his team, he is, in the opinion of the referee, involved in active play by:
- interfering with play or
- interfering with an opponent or
- gaining an advantage by being in that position"
Interfering with play means, essentially, touching the ball. Interfering with an opponent is what it sounds like. And gaining an advantage means playing the ball after it's rebounded off the post, or off an opponent.
With all that in mind, it's remarkable that Canada avoided an offside call in that sequence.
Kyle was completely unmarked -- but if she hadn't been, if she had drawn away the attention of a defender or the goalkeeper while she was in an offside position, no goal.
If Schmidt's shot, instead of bouncing off the defender into the path of Matheson, had bounced into the path of Kyle and she'd buried it, no goal.
If Matheson had somehow put her shot off the post or off the keeper, and Kyle then potted the rebound, no goal.
And, of course, if Kyle had gotten any touch whatsoever to Matheson's shot as it was in the process of going in, no goal. Hence her somewhat-awkward tuck-and-roll to get out of the way (an impressive, and game-saving, bit of awareness on her part).
In essence, the goal-scoring sequence itself was a perfect encapsulation of the game for Canada: So many things could (and maybe should) have gone wrong, but somehow, some way, the stars aligned and for once, the soccer gods smiled on us. No infringement of the Laws of the Game occurred. The assistant referee was correct in keeping the flag down. Matheson's goal was legit.