World Cup (no spoilers)

[mme_hardy]

 My current problem with football is terminology.

It is very clear to me that football is played from up to down, with one goal up and the other down.   Side-to-side is across the short dimension, not the long dimension.

Therefore the difficult thing to understand about the offside rule is that it has to do with placement up to down, not with placement side to side.

I think FIFA should be aware of this.

Comments

[legionseagle]

As with all rules of that type in sport (the infield fly, the lbw law, the offside rule) the secret is to work out what specific unfair act it was designed to prevent and then interpret the rules in the light of its purpose.

[mme_hardy]

Why *is* it unfair to run faster than the defenders to the goal?

[legionseagle]

It's not running faster than them, it's sneaking round the back of them.