New offside ruling goes into play tonight

AS well as being an important staging post on the road to next year’s World Cup finals, the Confederations Cup, will use a new clarification of the offside law for the first time.

Changes to laws regarding unsporting behaviour and players' equipment will also be implemented following decisions by the International Football Association Board (IFAB), soccer's ultimate law-making body, in Cardiff in February.

Italian referee Roberto Rosetti will be the first to judge on the new interpretations of the law when he officiates the match between Argentina and Tunisia in Cologne tonight.

The new wording, approved by the IFAB, clarifies three issues of the offside law where a player is actively in play whether he is interfering with play, interfering with an opponent or gaining an advantage by being in an offside position.

The new decisions are:

Interfering with play means playing or touching the ball passed or touched by a team mate.

Interfering with an opponent means preventing an opponent from playing or being able to play the ball by clearly obstructing the opponent's line of vision or movements or making a gesture or movement which, in the opinion of the referee, deceives or distracts an opponent.

Gaining an advantage by being in an offside position means playing a ball that rebounds to him off a post or crossbar or playing a ball that rebounds to him off an opponent having been in an offside position.

Players will also be booked for unsporting conduct which deliberately wastes time, such as kicking the ball away after the referee has stopped the game, or for delaying tactics when the ball has gone out of play for a corner or throw-in.

Fernando Tresaco Gracia of FIFA's referee's committee said: "We'll also be rigorous in enforcing the laws relating to players' equipment in this championship, and would remind players that it is strictly forbidden to wear potentially dangerous items such as pendants, necklaces or rings."

He said it was no longer permitted to cover those items with adhesive tape as this did not eliminate the risk of injury.

The other initiative taken at the International Board meeting related to the use of technology to decide whether the ball had crossed the line for a goal.

FIFA will experiment with this at the World Under-17 championship in Peru in September.