Hey folks, remember this? No? Well, OK, here's the obligatory explanation!
In addition to being a regular-turned-occasional blogger, social media irritant and unhealthily obsessive supporter of this game we all so deeply tolerate, I'm also a referee.
So for most of this site's existence, I've sporadically chimed in with Don't Fight The Laws, the confusingly named and often confusingly written feature wherein I draw from my decade and a half with the whistle (plus this one weird old trick I call "actually reading the FIFA Laws of the Game") to answer readers' questions about contentious decisions they've seen.
With a number of flashpoint decisions in Saturday's Toronto FC match, and that funny little tournament called the World Cup on the immediate horizon, I figured it an opportune time to wade back into the murky waters of "figuring out why the hell what happens on the field happens". Enough needlessly verbose preamble for you? Phew, me too. Let's get down to it, then.
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TFC emerged victorious over the visiting San Jose Earthquakes thanks to a Jermain Defoe penalty, called in the first half after San Jose's Alan Gordon was adjudged to have fouled Toronto's Nick Hagglund off a corner kick. You can render the entire preceding paragraph redundant by checking out these video highlights (the PK incident is at about 2:20):
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There wasn't a reader question about this per se. It was more of a Twitter back-and-forth between me and long-time TFC reporter Gareth Wheeler, instigated by this tweet:
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p>Don't love that penalty call. Even if Gordon didn't foul him, would Hagglund have got to the ball? <a href="https://twitter.com/search?q=%23TFCLive&src=hash">#TFCLive</a></p>— Gareth Wheeler (@WheelerTSN) <a href="
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Now, Wheels knows the game. I'm not going to dispute that. And upon further interaction, it became clear that he was referring to the practice (not codified or written anywhere, but generally accepted as reality by most people who watch or are involved in games) that refs sometimes need to see "a little extra" before they're willing to call a penalty, since a spot kick can be such a crucial, game-changing moment.
This tendency has led some people who follow the game -- not Wheeler, but plenty of other people I've talked to -- to believe that it's actually part of the Laws of the Game.
I'm here today to tell you, clearly and unequivocally, that it's not.
In order for a penalty kick to be awarded, the attacking player does not need to have been in a scoring position. They do not need to be moving towards the goal. In fact, they don't even need to have possession of the ball. For that matter, the ball doesn't even need to be inside the penalty area, or anywhere near it.
Quite simply, a penalty kick results when any infringement that would have resulted in a direct free kick anywhere else on the field occurs inside the defending team's penalty area. Or, in FIFA's words:
A penalty kick is awarded against a team that commits one of the ten offences for which a direct free kick is awarded, inside its own penalty area and while the ball is in play.
Those 10 offences, in case you don't have them memorized -- shame on you -- are when a player in a manner judged by the referee to be careless, reckless or using excessive force: 1) kicks or attempts to kick an opponent; 2) trips or attempts to trip an opponent; 3) jumps at an opponent; 4) charges an opponent; 5) strikes or attempts to strike an opponent; 6) pushes an opponent or 7) tackles an opponent; or when a player 8) holds an opponent; 9) spits at an opponent or 10) deliberately handles the ball.
We can safely presume that in the above case, referee Fotis Bazakos decided that Gordon's wayward elbow met the threshold for carelessly striking an opponent (hey look, it's number 5!); hence, the penalty. Now, whether the call was harsh (Hagglund appeared to make a bit of a meal of it) is a matter up for reasonable debate. But whether or not he'd have gotten to the ball without Gordon's interference is irrelevant.
All that matters is, did the ref believe a direct-free-kick infringement was committed? If so, it's a penalty.
Now, if we're talking about whether or not Gordon should have been shown a red card for the offence, that's where Hagglund's position vis-a-vis the ball and the goal could potentially be relevant. From Law 12, under reasons for a player to be shown the red card:
denying an obvious goalscoring opportunity to an opponent moving towards the player's goal by an offence punishable by a free kick or a penalty kick
This is what covers situations that are colloquially referred to as "last man" or "professional" fouls, the most professional of which was Ole Gunnar Solskjaer against Newcastle back in 1998:
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Now, this is a whole other subject for another day (though there was a situation in Toronto-San Jose where, perhaps, a 'Quakes defender should have been sent off for seemingly denying TFC an obvious goalscoring opportunity by handling the ball). But for today, we're answering the question "what the hell is a penalty kick?"
And the answer, as we've established, is quite simple: A penalty kick is anything done by the defending team inside their own penalty area that would result in a direct free kick anywhere else on the field. Doesn't matter where the ball is (as long as it's in play), doesn't matter where the player is (as long as he's inside the penalty area) and it doesn't matter whether or not there was a goalscoring opportunity.
Is that rule unfair and outdated? Maybe. Do referees realistically enforce things a bit differently inside the penalty area, knowing how important a penalty kick can be? Maybe. Should the "triple punishment" rule (wherein players can concede a penalty, be sent off and face suspension for a singular event) be revised? Maybe.
But for now, the Laws are what they are.
Have a question for Don't Fight the Laws about the Laws of the Game or their enforcement? Get in touch on Twitter @DanielSquizzato.
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