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Should of, Could of, Would of
The consequences of my decisions have nothing to do with absolutes or adding time they have everything to do with not expecting any problems. I was too confident that nothing would go wrong. It did and I was unprepared to deal with it.
The game had all ready been extended the full 2 minutes of injury time at the occurrence of the corner kick foul. By the time I had red carded the player for preventing a goal scoring opportunity and dealt with the aftermath of discontent I could see no reason not to inform the teams this was an extended time penalty kick. It is not necessary by law to remove them to the center circle as in a shoot out situation. Only to remove them away from the immediate penalty area and inform everyone there can be no interference as time had expired and only the shooter and keeper had any business in the penalty area. Although Law 14 gives the impression that any deflection involving the goalposts, crossbar and keeper or any combination thereof could result in a legal goal. I believe if I had followed my gut, which was to blow the whistle when the shot hit the crossbar and rebounded away from the goal. the game would be over and the result a draw. Whatever dissent might have arisen if after the whistle the ball wound up back in the net I could easily justify my decision to the players if not the assessors. Perhaps the sound of my whistle would have caused the keeper to alter his position ever so slightly as not, to have the fluky rebound off the head. The shot clearly missed and in keeping with the spirit of the game, it bothered me because when your gut tells you should blow for a foul or compromising situation it generally is the correct game management decision.
In my opinion a goal should not be allowed if the ball hits the crossbar, rebounds back into play, hits the back of the goalkeeper's head after he has dived out into the field of play in extended time.
In other words, as soon as the ball rebounds back into play, the period should be ended and the penalty kick finished. If the ball deflects directly downwards from the crossbar, onto the head of the goalkeeper who is standing on his goal line, and travels over the goal line between the goalposts - the goal should be allowed.
However, in following this little debacle to its conclusion by allowing play to continue until the kicker's serious foul play or violent conduct? I am still unclear as to which is applicable because I remain unsure whether play was truly over. I originally thought once you have blown your whistle to end the match, you cannot red or yellow card players. I have been made aware that you can show cards to players prior and just after a games conclusion. I thought you could only write up an incident report. The Kicker's elbow incident would have to be recorded as either violent conduct or serious foul play. Since I had the penalty kick retaken I wrote it up as serious foul play and red carded the kicker.
Note: Serious Foul Play occurs when the ball is in play, and when two opponents are contesting for the ball.
Violent Conduct occurs outside of the immediate play action and can occur when the ball is in or out of play.
It has been stated by several others that once my whistle sounded the penalty kick was finished and play was over. I could not legally retake the penalty. Although there was a definite altercation it would not have prevented a goal and by blowing the whistle I effectively ended the game and would have to live with the consequences of no goal by ending the game before the ball completely crossed the goal line.
Humble pie anyone? I got lots left!!
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