It's 2020, they can be whatever they wants
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All I can say is that all defenders in my games are now going to think they can defend a free kick like this because two EPL referees think it's not handball.
You'd expects this from U12 park football not from a pro footballer (in the top ten highest paid I think).
I disagree with your prediction of the ball's path. I am fairly certain it is going through the gap with a possible small deflection.If his hands aren't there, the ball hits his face. The handball law was written to disallow hands/arms in an unnatural position.
To provide a counter to all the blustering positions here, the handball law was written to disallow hands/arms in an unnatural position that stop the ball moving past the player. If De Bruyne's hands aren't there, the ball hits his face or it hits Laporte. The 'handball' doesn't stop the ball going in the goal. While not in line with what proper football men want, I'm not giving this in my games.
That said, should top-level professionals be held to a higher standard? Possibly. But to say that it isn't natural to instinctively block your face is just wrong.
If his hands aren't there, the ball hits his face. The handball law was written to disallow hands/arms in an unnatural position.
To provide a counter to all the blustering positions here, the handball law was written to disallow hands/arms in an unnatural position that stop the ball moving past the player. If De Bruyne's hands aren't there, the ball hits his face or it hits Laporte. The 'handball' doesn't stop the ball going in the goal. While not in line with what proper football men want, I'm not giving this in my games.
That said, should top-level professionals be held to a higher standard? Possibly. But to say that it isn't natural to instinctively block your face is just wrong.
Back to the wider debate. I'm still amazed that everyone including referees are 'surprised' we have decisions we don't agree with.
Doesn't matter if the VAR looks at it 20 times, if the pitch referee looks at the monitor, they speed it up, slow it down. show the crowd blah blah blah - its still a SUBJECTIVE decision and like all those we all make week in week out they WILL be debated and disagreed with.
Even supporters of VAR can surely see that NO system is ever going to produce decisions that all agree with?
I get that on things like penalty decisions, but the two David Coote VAR decisions yesterday were both obvious and I'd say at least 90% of referees would agree on them. Not necessarily his fault though, I suspect the officials are baffled by the instructions they are being given and it is leading to problems.
Well, not exactly. Rs make decisions solely on the recommendations of ARs all the time. It’s just not true to say (even without VAR) that the R makes all subjective decisions himself—he often makes the decision to accept the subjective recommendation of an AR as the sole basis for a decision.
I agree with you that the R should be doing an OFR for all subjective decisions. And that is true everywhere in the world except the PL. in the PL and the rest of the world, the VAR is only supposed to get involved if the VAR thinks there is a clear error. We need to keep that in mind—VAR is not supposed to be used on close subjective decisions, only on clearly erroneous subjective decisions. The VAR here could certainly have been thinking “Inwould have called that”—but he needs more than just that to send it down, he needs to be,eve it was a clear errror to think it was not handling.