The international offside law has been updated after a fourth-tier Swedish club exposed a ‘loophole’ in the regulations – but the flaw in the rules still exists.
Torns IF, a club from the small settlement of Stangby, caught the attention of world football in the summer of 2023 when they released a video revealing the problem.
The traditional rules dictated that offsides would be judged based off when the passer first made contact with the ball in their final touch.
In the vast majority of scenarios, this is no issue at all because when a player typically kicks a football, the ‘first contact’ is also their ‘last contact’.
But Torns demonstated that if a player could scoop up the ball and balance it on their foot, a team-mate could theoretically run well beyond the defence and not count as offside even if they released a pass multiple seconds later in the same ‘touch’.
It is hard to ever envision that scenario happening in a game due to the pressure players are under, but Torns wrote to IFAB, football’s lawmakers, over the issue.
Football’s offside rules have been changed after a Swedish team exposed a ‘loophole’ – but the amendment does not actually fix the problem
Torns IF found that if a player could balance a ball on their foot and release it, the rules allowed a team-mate to travel offside as they counted when ‘first contact’ was made for the pass
The law has been updated, but only pertaining to goalkeepers, so the ‘loophole’ stands
Now, almost two years down the line, IFAB have replied to thank the club and reveal that they have updated the rules of the game.
Torns IF, from a place with an approximated population of around 2,000 people, have technically helped change the rules of the beautiful game for us all.
But not so fast. The problem has not really been solved. IFAB’s updated rules read: ‘The first point of contact of the ‘play’ or ‘touch’ of the ball should still be used; however, when the ball is thrown by the goalkeeper, the last point of contact should be used.’
IFAB have only updated the law applying to goalkeepers but theoretically, Torns’ ‘scoop pass’ way of circumventing the law still stands.
The club wrote on X: ‘We did it. Torns IF changed the rules of football. After the introduction of the Torn pass and lengthy e-mail correspondence with IFAB, the offside law has been amended. We are immensely proud of our contribution to the beautiful game.’
But they added in a separate post: ‘IFAB’s distinction between passes is hard to understand. The clarification of the offside law only applies to keeper throws and not to related passes, e.g. scoop and swivel passes. But, it’s a win for us. We changed the rules, and some types of the Torn Pass can still be used.’
Writing in 2023, Torns IF proudly revealed their cunning trick: ‘Torns IF have developed an ingenious method to create one-on-ones with the goalkeeper.
‘It’s based on a rule found on page 93 in the Laws of the Game stating that the first point of contact of the ‘play’ or ‘touch’ of the ball” should be used when judging offside. Groundbreaking.
‘This is amusing and interesting. In terms of the “spirit” of the Law, this is obviously offside and, in terms of the Law itself, the “balancing” of the ball on the foot is a different “play” from the movement which gives the ball momentum to move.
‘We will review if the wording of Law 11 needs changing in light of this “theoretical” situation.’
