- Aug 13, 2004
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Recent IFAB interpretations of the hand ball law take into account using your arms to make yourself bigger. In that respect I agree with your points; his arm was away from his body, making it more likely that he block any shot. However, the player was only a few yards away from the shot and had no time to react. I believe the referee saw the outstretched elbow, and accoding to new interpretations, gave it, not knowing that it hit his back shoulder first. Referees with a hard-on for the rules give that, I would not. Referees have to be 100% that there's an infringement and not just guess at it, especially in such an important situation.Actually his hand and lower arm were not tight against his body, his hand was out in front of him and had it hit his hand directly it would have been a nailed on penalty especially as he turned his arm towards the ball, it didn't just hit him because he couldn't avoid it.
That was probably behind the referee's thinking, it did hit his upper arm after all, so the only argument is whether it was intentional, I think probably not.
I do think we could make an argument for a penalty had it gone the other way though.