That's a really interesting and well thought out post
@CapnBloodbeard , but I just have a few questions about it.
Bold mine. These two statements seem to strike me as mutually exclusive. If you're positioning yourself between the ball and the middle of the PA, where do you look? If you're looking at the ball to judge in/out of play, anything could happen in the PA before the ball is delivered and you have no chance of catching it. If you're looking at the PA, you've got less chance of telling where the ball is going, plus a non-zero chance of being in the way of a ball that is going along the line. Strikes me as less than ideal.
Some good responses here Graeme and you've picked up well on a few possible issues.
you're quite right - this does leave you in a position where the ball and players are on completely different sides of you - and if it's a short corner you could be left with a problem too (in that case it's probably worth running out along the goal line to get a view of the ball and the drop zone), although I don't recall this ever being an issue.
Anyway, to respond to your concern - yes, it does mean that if the ball is swerving out/in you're taking your eyes off the drop zone. Almost every time, the moment the ball is kicked you know if this is going to be an issue. A quick glance back and forth is usually sufficient without causing problems. If you know players are getting physical in the box, you're looking at them and you hear the ball being kicked...well, you may have to make a decision not to be watching the ball. Offhand I don't think I've really run into a problem here.
I'd personally disagree with this. A goal is of course the most critical decision, but borderline in/not in the goal decisions are incredibly rare - I can think of 2 in 3.5 years of refereeing where I wish I'd been on the goal line at a corner. The alternative is a potential DOGSO decision or a PK up the other end when a quick counter does occur - which I'd be shocked if you don't at least have to make some kind of game-changing decision at minimum once per match, even if that is a "no foul" decision.
I suppose if you're fit/fast enough, you can expect to catch up more often than not, but do you often find yourself having to make a big decision like that from a long way away?
Interesting that your experience is so different - I'd probably have more than 2 a season!!
But it goes back to what I was saying about weighing up what's likely, what's significant, and so forth. In your experience the chances are much, much lower that being on the GL will help you, so that will influence your decision.
In something like 15 years of refereeing, the number of times where I've felt that I didn't have a good view of a challenge in a potential DOGSO/PK situation I could probably count on one hand. More often than not you can clearly spot a foul from any distance. Sometimes you can't which is why we run our backsides off. Though it's angle that's more important than closeness.
Anyway, the fast counter that amounts to anything significant is fairly unusual - and the vast majority of the time the foul will either be clear to spot, or there's going to be no issue at all. But yes, it is certainly a possibility - and my fitness and speed have typically been pretty good which helps. The age and skill of the players are probably a factor worth considering here too in how fast they can get the ball upfield.
I would agree that it can mean you're out of position for a critical decision at the other end of the field. In my personal experience though, the GL position means I'm likely going to be in a better position for a more likely critical decision up this end (and to reiterate comments before, the critical decision I'm talking about here, there's no notion of 'good view but not perfect'. You either see it or don't. The critical decision up the other end, even if I'm still 50 yards behind play I have some view of it).