Argentines use 'free-kick' spray to stop creeping defenders

Professor Nutmeg

Professor Nutmeg

ML Fanatic
3 July 2002
Master League
(From the BBC news website)


The Argentine Football Association is to introduce an aerosol spray to stop defenders creeping closer to the ball during a free-kick.

From next year, referees will use the spray in first division matches.

Referees will mark a temporary white line 9.15 metres (10 yards) from the ball, which defenders cannot cross. The spray will disappear 30 seconds later.

Pablo Silva, who invented the spray, got the idea when he failed to score with a free-kick at an amateur match.

"In the 88th minute, we were losing 1-0 and won a free-kick on the edge of the area. When I took the kick, the wall was three metres away," he told Reuters earlier this year.

"The referee didn't book anyone and didn't do anything," he said.

"We lost the game, and driving home later, with a mixture of anger and bitterness, I thought that we must invent something to stop this."

The spray has been trialled in second division matches and a similar spray has been used in some competitions in Brazil.
 
But what about the ozon ???
The gap will become even bigger...
Good for football, bad from an ecologist point of view...
 
Thank God, I really, really really hope this is implemented worldwide. Walls are a f*cking joke these days, and really take away from the excitement of free kicks. And refs suck at enforcing it.
 
gerd said:
But what about the ozon ???
The gap will become even bigger...
Good for football, bad from an ecologist point of view...
Click to expand...

Mate I'm not an expertise but I believe is one of those sprays that don't affect the ozon. I forgot the name now.

This is good not only for holding the wall but the referees also mark where the ball should be placed.
 
Why shouldn't it work?
You draw a temporary line and whoever crosses it gets booked. Fourth official could keep an eye on that in particular, but it shouldn't be too hard for the head ref to watch it, neither.
 
is this necessary

why cant the ref just book them regardless of a line or not
they should be trained to do this instead of being pussies
 
this spray works great in argentina's league. it's a simple and extremely quick way to guarrantee the regular distance. the players can "see" the limit and the ref can easily realise when a player is pushing to much.
personally i would love to see italian refs using this system aswell.
 
Last edited:
lo zio said:
this spray works great in argentina's league. it's a simple and extremely quick way to guarrantee the regular distance. the players can "see" the limit and the ref can easily realise when a player is puching to much.
personally i would love to see italian refs using this system aswell.
Click to expand...

Exactly my opinion!
I hate it when hyper-active players in the wall ruin freekick situations.
 
Rentalkid said:
Exactly my opinion!
I hate it when hyper-active players in the wall ruin freekick situations.
Click to expand...

yeah i hate that too. Sometimes the refs stop the play and tell the defenders to move backwards.... they do it and then, just a few seconds before the whistle they move foward again.

it is a real issue... especially for those players who take a long run before kicking the ball (like totti, for instance). by the time they reach the ball, the wall moves 3, 4 meters ahead.
 
The problem is how this is gonna be handled by refs...
Let's take a penalty as an example. To my knowledge any foul in the box is a penalty.
I remeber a ref at a WC (i think it was in 2002 in the match Spain-Ireland) who gave a penalty because a Spanish player pulled the shirt of an Irish player...after the match there was general outrage because this was a very, very soft penalty....the result of this trend is that fouls who are always given outside the box are not necassarily given in the box...i hate the expression "a soft penalty" because a foul inside the box is a penalty...
With this spray and free kicks i see something similar happening. In the beginning every player who crosses that line will get penalized but after a while people are gonna say: "well he only crossed the line a couple of inches, that should not be penalized" and there you go again...

In theory it's a great idea...the problem is that there are more and more coaches, owners, presidents, players (not to mention Blatter himself) who are influencing referees on and off the pitch...this should stop and then the use of this spray would make sense.
As long as the influencing is tolerated, the spray is useless IMHO..
 
gerd said:
With this spray and free kicks i see something similar happening. In the beginning every player who crosses that line will get penalized but after a while people are gonna say: "well he only crossed the line a couple of inches, that should not be penalized" and there you go again...
Click to expand...

8 Years being used here in Brazil and that did not happen.
Well of course players go forward a couple of inches, but that is it.

Sometimes I see some ridiculous close walls in Europe that never happens here.

Anyway this should not be compared to the soft foul in the box thing,
I think is more similar to the penalty or corner mark, the rule says the ball need to be in that area or at least touch the line, sometimes a player puts just a little far from the line, but that is it.
Its not like those inches matters, the thing is that restrict the more ridiculous cases.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom