Probably goes against the intention behind the offside rule though. It's all about gaining an unfair advantage... that's it. I always think when you're dealing in millimeters, that can't possibly be an "unfair" advantage.
Carabao Cup 2026: Semi-Finals
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In the latest edition of the United Hour Podcast, we interview Duncan Drasdo of MUST - covering ticket prices, new stadium, INEOS and what fans should be demanding from our club.
Also, due to technical issues we couldn't put a notice up for the previous episode which was about the game against Bournemouth and other stuff. If you'd like to listen to it, click here.
I didn't see any picture with the offside lines drawn, but just from the frames shown in my coverage, he was fairly clearly ahead of the keeper. I'd guess about half a boot length of thereabouts.
Sure, but good luck adding "intention of the offside rule".
"Yeah, he's blatantly offside, but the opposition player is 30m away so is it really an unfair advantage, would it had mattered for the situation if he was 1 meter onside instead of 2 meter offside"
They should go with the linesmans decision unless it's over a specific threshold IMO, say a couple inches or something.
That's what they're doing now. The specific threshold is 0 and your approach would lead to the very same VAR checks.
It changes what types of checks they'll be looking at - the offside would need to be much more blatant than the current 0mm checking.
It wouldn't change anything. It would just move the question from 'blatant or not' to 'blatant enough or not'
Of course it would. All of these fractional offsides would be immediately ejected from the conversation. They'd only need to look at cases where it's over the threshold, and therefore the attacker gained an unfair advantage, in which case it's worth looking at so is less frustrating.
It wouldn't. It would be the very same fractional decisions. Just around a different line.
You will still get milimeter decisions either way.
Yes, of course there is still that, but my point is that they would only need to consider more obvious offsides where it can be argued that there is a clear advantage. Right now, if your foot is say 1mm further ahead than the defender, you can't reasonably say that's an advantage. If it's over say 2 inches however (or whatever threshold we want), it's an "advantage".
Nope. Nothing changes. All,too subjective. We’ve already been down to the length of a player’s toenail and still can’t agree. Offside needs binning. Arguments against relate back to primary school. Ok, a player is goal hanging… so, fecking mark him. How difficult can it be? Does away with an awful lot of bullshit and unnecessary arguing
I don't know why people struggle so much with the concept that measuring anything means there will always be something outside that measurement by a fraction. Allow them 5cm and you are now measuring to see if they are 5.1cm off. Its really simple. You don't remove the problem, you just shift it to a slightly different place.
The only advantage to allowing a small amount of advantage to the attacker is to make drawing the lines a little easier because you would be looking for an attackers body part that was clearly beyond the defenders to draw that line. It would still result in X + a tiny bit issues though.
The only advantage to allowing a small amount of advantage to the attacker is to make drawing the lines a little easier because you would be looking for an attackers body part that was clearly beyond the defenders to draw that line. It would still result in X + a tiny bit issues though.
you Are still arguig if he is 2 inches or 1.99 inches on the wrong side
Yes I know, I am not saying that problem will go away - what I am saying is that the offside decisions should be clearer and fairer and more aligned to the original intention which was to prevent unfair advantages.
Do you not understand the difference between relative and absolute?
The question of relative will always remain as measurements come with margin and uncertainty. The question is whether the absolute frame of reference (the definition of offside) should be changed. I don't think it should be (for the reason that we don't need to give more advantages to attackers) but it has nothing to do with uncertainty around measurement
I think the original intention was valid back then, but has been clawed back by improvements in player fitness and game pace, so I'm ok with retaining the current definition of offside to be attacker (marginally) ahead of the last defender.
If the rule was made today, I think the line would have been placed such that there would need to be daylight between the attacker and defender.
First reaction it was a pen …Haaland is entitled to be in the box without someone’s arm around his neck, also another Newc defender had his arms around Semenyo’s waist.
If not a penalty and it takes VAR five fecking minutes to decide then it was obviously a goal.
If not a penalty and it takes VAR five fecking minutes to decide then it was obviously a goal.
I'm confused.
Ok
The absolute definition of offside: the attacker is beyond the defender by any margin (a toenail, etc). According to @SuperiorXI, this should be changed to there being daylight between the attacker and the defender.
Relative: measurement and referee and angle error may influence how marginal offside decisions are determined. Because of the relative, no matter where we draw the line, there will always be argument. However the purpose of changing the definition of offside is not to eliminate argument.
Thought exercise. Let's say that we have a robot drone capable of always making the right decision on offside with zero measurement error (relative). We still have to tell the robot what offside actually means (absolute). And it will be a valid debate between "any margin between attacker and defender" and "daylight between attacker and defender".
I think you have a very strange use of the terms absolute and relative.
Not that it really matters. Again, no matter how you want to define offside, daylight between attacker and defender, daylight + a few inches, there's always going to be marginal decisions and marginal decisions are followed by debates about how marginal it is. Sure, we might discover that people find offside decisions to be overall more acceptable, no matter how marginal they are, when you re-define the threshold of offside, but that has nothing to do with anything being absolute or relative. But until we have a technological revolution where automated offside is flawless, we'll still have situations where VAR spends a small eternity to determine if a player is offside or onside
Chelsea vs Arse. Who do we want to win?
Chelsea... But with that line up they have no chance, too many players missing
Who might beat City?
4.5 years since Chelsea have beaten Arsenal in any competition according to Talksport; didn’t realise it was that long.
Definitely rooting for Arsenal hear.
Definitely rooting for Arsenal hear.
How long is Caicedo suspended for? Feels like I haven't seen him in ages
Arse fans are terrible, so Chelsea. Who also have terrible fans, just not quite as awful.
White give Arsenal the lead from a corner.
Stoke score from another corner
Some things never change
fecking hell they've finally scored from a corner!
Do they ever score a goal from open play?
Is the pope an atheist?
It’s ridiculous how many times they get away with that sly little nudge on the keeper at corners.
Chelsea trying to play out from the back 
set piece cnuts.
It's such a fecking comedy to see a goal like that allowed after the Haaland situation yesterday. Leave it to English referees to do a complete 180 less than 24 hours after a pretty much identical situation resulted in a goal being disallowed.
Absolute fecking clowns
Absolute fecking clowns
If yesterday was offside, how was that not offside?
If Semenyos goal was disallowed yesterday, that one should’ve.