The Ohio State University: College of Education and Human Ecology

Offsides Rule – 1

What is the offside rule, anyway?

The offside rule works to avoid “cherry picking,” or players who stand close to the opposing goal and wait to score while undefended (or “open”) by the other team. This gives the offensive team an unfair advantage to score, which is why the offside rule exists.

The blue X’s are the offensive team, they have the ball and are trying to score on the red O’s. The red O’s are defending their goal. There is a blue X player who is standing next to the goal, “past” the second-to-last defender, which puts them in an offside position.

The Offside Rule – 1

The first offside principle to remember is being even with or “behind” the second-to-last defender. This means there must be 2 defending players between you (an offensive player) and the goal. Most of the time, the goalkeeper counts as one of those players, but the goalkeeper is not always included in the 2 defending players count.

Imagine that there is a line across the field that moves with the second-to-last defender. Any offensive players “behind” this line are “onside” and not in violation of the offside rule.

Any offensive players “beyond” or past the offside “line” are offside, or in violation of the rule.

The blue X’s are the offensive team, they have the ball and are trying to score on the red O’s. The red O’s are defending their goal. There is a blue X player who is standing next to the goal, “past” the second-to-last defender, which puts them in an offside position. This time there is a line drawn across the field even with the second-to-last defender. This makes it easy to see the blue X player that is offside.

As the second-to-last defender moves up the field, that imaginary “offside line” moves with them. If you aren’t paying attention, you might become in an offside position, even when you weren’t before. Notice the second blue X in the image, who is now offside, because the second-to-last defender moved “up” the field, and the offensive player did not move with them.

The second-to-last defender moved “up” the field, or closer to the halfway line, which moved the offside line with them. There was another blue X offensive player who did not move with them, and is now offside.

One last thing to remember is that you need to be considered “onside” or even with the second-to-last defender only when the ball is kicked. Once the ball is kicked to you or toward the goal, you are allowed to run behind the defense to receive it, assuming you are faster than your defender! Just because you receive the ball behind the second-to-last defender does not mean you are offside, as long as you were even with them when the ball was played.

Other examples of the first tenet of the offside rule:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U67vJZyEcb4 video of Abby Wambach of the USWNT “behind” the second-to-last defender making her offsides and the goal she scores does not count due to a violation of the rule.

https://twitter.com/i/status/1142830555139936256 video of Ellen White of the England Women’s National team being called offside (she received the ball behind the defense) but after video review, the call was overturned, showing that she was onside when the ball was kicked, meaning she did not violate the offside rule.