That's why they invented Rugby.

5 subs, you would lose continuity, 3 is perfect, rarely do teams use all 3 in case someone important (eg the keeper) gets hurt, 1 or 2 subs in a match does not really change a team's personality too much, hate the england friendlies where sven used to replace half the team

15mins suspensions, sounds silly we just need more cards given out for dishonest actions like diving

no offsides idea is ok, don't see how current linesman would be able to handle this though, they have a hard time getting it right as it is

maybe 3 subs during the match + 2 subs allowed at half-time

there are a lot of little things that can't be punished with yellow cards (like pushing before a freekick/corner takes place), the referee needs to have something to make the game as fair as possible

as i said.. forget about the offside rule if these conditions are met:
1. the receiver is not crossing the 16m penalty box line, which is marked so it's easy to spot
2. the sender is not in his own half (again another marked line)
would be really easy to apply since now offside rule has 2 clear boundaries

Having seen enough of sin binning in rugby I'd strongly agree, much better to card players than have sides a man short. It harms the game more than it helps.

well, who gives a fuck about cards in football unless it's a red card? at least you get punished for fouls in rugby.

maybe for leagues you could rule that the yellow cards forbid the player to play in the rematch in that or the next season as an additional punishment.

Of course the severity depends on how often the teams play each other but it might just work.

Dunno about the offsides idea. The rationale for its existence is still valid, i.e. without offsides the most viable tactic is leaving a striker near the enemy goal at all times, which in turn forces a defender to stay there as well, which in turn makes the attacking team leave another one etc. Even if you were allowed to only pass once you're across the middle line, the defending team couldn't risk leaving a lone attacker infront of their goal. The result would be a very static game. It just takes too long in football to cross the pitch for it to work

Why would the result be a very static game? The ball's movement would potentially be more dynamic as there would be less mid-field congestion. The defenders and attackers would run back and forth less but the actual game would probably move up and down the field more quickly. There would still be a push to move defenders further up the field as it gains a benefit, it would at least be interesting to see the effect. Depth comes from risk vs reward trade offs, removing off-side potentially gives excessive attacker reward (is that bad?) but adds a great trade off for defender position while removing one of the weirder parts of the game's rules.

I'd fear it would result in typical hit and rush football, with balls being passed from one goal to the other. The problem I see is that defender don't really have a choice. A lone player infront of the goalkeeper is so much in favor of the attacker that the defending team couldn't risk moving up, even if attackers would stay at the midfield since all you need is one breakthrough for an almost certain goal

Two things professional football desperately needs..

Video replays for ultra important situations, ie contested ball crossing the line moments, or suspect penalties, to limit the negative impact of this, each team could have a limit of 3 requests for replay confirmation or something, those arguing it slows down the game can fuck off, 3 minutes is nothing compared to all the bullshit protests you get from players in controversial matches

Nationals minimums, e.g. at least the majority of an EPL team (inc subs) has to be English, this would give teams more local identity and help the national team.

With a little technology there's no reason why it should take so long, again using a rugby example they seem to take an eternity when referring to the video referee, usually for the absurd 'is there any reason not to award this try' question, then they whine about teams not going for tries enough.

about the foreign rules, it used to be like that until Bosmann i think. max of 3 foreigners in squad. Its still this way(Max 3 non-eu in squad) but EU players you can have as many as you like playing cause of the EU rules of free labour or whatever its called in english :p

It depends on the country.

England has no rules regarding players nationalities.

ah yea, i know some countries like spain have rules like that, didn't remember uk did as well :>

As long as the country is in the EU you cannot legally limit anyone from employing/contracting someone from another EU country.

Employing and letting play in an actual match are 2 different things though I think. Afaik there's limits in Germany regarding the number of non-EU players on the field at a time, but overall you can employ and use as many as you want. Or something like that.

also..

In England..
run the carling cup for non-EPL teams only, remove the fa cup semis from Wembly

In Europe..
Scrap the shitty Eufa cup.

Make the CL do what it says on the tin, ie. run it as an actual league, and make it for champions only, not league runners up, 3rd place teams etc.

Champions only would seriously suck, just take a look at the teams that reached the final 8 this year, only half of them are champions

Ye, champions league would suck if only each league champion played it. Lots of top notch teams would be missing each year. In fact, if this happened, UEFA cup (which I agree sucks and is useless) would be better than champions league :P

Removing UEFA cup you kinda kills any chance teams outside Spain, France, UK, Italy, Germany will do well and get experience in playing international football.

get 66 convicts, add 4 more goals on the pitch, remove any kind of fouls and adjust a few rules rules. Weapons not allowed
????
Profit

lol ideas.

if u want more action just watch some other sport? like say basketball?

every sport has these issues. u can get bored of anything. doesnt mean it needs to be changed.

football rules (and most sports rules) have changed throughout the years to improve the game (pitch size, ball type, post shape, offside, passing to goalkeeper, golden/silver goal, sanctions etc. etc.)

thanks for your inane reply anyway..

learn to read? i just said that the fact that someone finds occasional games boring or goes through a phase in which they're bored with a sport is not a valid reason for changing the sport itself.

for a classic case of how changing rules for idiot reasons can backfire, take f1.

im not bored with the sport itself, im bored with how people abuse it.. some things needs to be enforced to overcome this -> hence the required changes

i agree on the behavior part. but then again people trying to "sell the play" is nothing new. but yea in football it does seem excessive. and i think the only solution likely to work is for the punishments to be financial and heavy. start banning people for long periods of time and tie it in with their fees.

but again the problem with this is that u need to keep it on the field. taking decisions off the field almost always turns out a bad idea. so without better refereeing its just unposs.

on an aside i dont suppose u euros follow baseball but its by far the most entertaining sport rules wise. i mean 2 of the most prominent baseball players were found guilty of using performance enhancers. one supposedly admitted it altho he lied about it first and only came forward when he was sure it was gonna come out. that guy isnt being punished period. the other guy is banned for 50 games, which is peanuts in baseball and loses some 8 out of 40 million bucks he gets paid this year. talk about lol. shocking that people still watch the game.

ohh yeah basketball is so action packed.
I saw a match in Newyork some years ago, it sucked so much
breaks all the time for commercials and team time-outs. zzzz
even the cheerleaders are fat and boring.

Needs more xerp.

mean mean ogc?

They should just stop using yellow cards to punish stupid actions like protests, diving, chest-hand in a barrier (this years modality), blocking a foul kick, etc. Yellow cards are a serious punishment and most of the time are used for irrelevant stuff, while true game related, or injuring fouls get nothing if the injurer already has a yellow card. Get some new "unesportive foul card" for that minor stuff and make it of a minor grade than yellow cards.

EDIT: And show more yellow cards for the real deserving fouls, of course.

Diving and nasty behavior from players is one of the biggest problems with the sport in my opinion, i dont see how you can label them minor things... besides, the rules are that unsporting behavior deserves a yellow, so the refs should enforce that rule.

I don't say diving, or the other things, aren't relevant. What I say is that referees use the first yellow for such things (I forgot to mention the best of all: taking the t-shirt out) and then they hesitate to show a second yellow for true playing fouls. If you watch any game currently around 75% of the yellow cards shown aren't related to playing football at all. I say, make a new cards cathegory that doesn't accumulate with yellows for unsportive behaviors, make them accumulate on their own up to a red card, and don't hesitate so much to show well deserved cards of both kinds.

The problem with your argument is not the rules, its the poor referees that show bad judgement when they don't give a second yellow card, because he already had one.

Yeah, if referees would just give out the cards according to the rules players would soon shut the fuck up, stop diving, stop shirt pulling, stop whining and stop professional fouling (or at least keep it to a minimum).

Rugby style microphone rules would be good too and any player who questions any decision should be booked.

That said, it would be nice if there were other cards for different problems just so it was obvious what the card was being given for.

Dissent should equal 5minutes sin bin rather than a card.

and a kick in the nuts

couldnt agree more. i dont really follow soccer as much since im in the us but even in the major games that i did watch, this years refereeing has been just shit.

i think most of the problems right now are because referees are just too weak and too incompetent to deserve any respect.

Diving should be insta-red

fucking disgusting behavior completely against the spirit of the game

should allow defenders to get 1 free foul (no matter how bad) on them in return.


teeee-heeee. :D

I'd add rollerskates and remove all fouls. Just pit those sons of bitches against eachother in a small pitch covered with asfalt and ramps and ZING WONG SWOOSH OH MY GOD WHAT JUST HAPPENDDDDD

get proper refs (tmo and maybe more side refs), maybe make a yellow card punishment harder (both a ban for future games if you get several cards, and a sinbin time during the ongoing game maybe), and change the way free kicks are handled (maybe something like kicking in touch as in rugby, but then again lineouts aren't that useful in football compared). right now a free kick anywhere but around the 16m box is nothing but a slowdown of the game.

Yellow cards are collected as disciplinary points that eventually gives suspension for X games. This is the case for most leagues, like EPM. In tourmanets like WC or CHL once you collect a 2nd yellow card you're suspended for a game. The "status" of cards is usually reset when you proceed from groups into play-off games.

I know. :)

I think that they should to a greater extent punish people afterwards if it was clear they did something against the rules. However, adding video requests, more small punishments, time limited in game suspensions, more substitutes and so on would just break up the game and remove any sense of flow.

Ah yeah, make the goals slightly higher and slightly wider to reward offensive play a bit more, and give us more goals in general.

Oh yes, another rule change I'd like in order to keep the flow of the game and make it a bit more interesting. Throw ins shouldn't occur unless the the ball touches the ground outside the side lines. Meaning that you could shoot the ball back into the game as long as its in the air. Corners would be unchanged.

As a north american (canada), what bugs me the most about soccer, or football as you euros call it is how diluted the sport is on such huge fields. What i mean is that you have such talented players that do those amazing moves/shots but when it gets on the field these doesnt to influence the game pace that much.

Personally i cant stand watching football on tv. Golf is more interesting to me even if golf is boring to watch (and i play it often). What would make me more interested in football would be much smaller play area and less players on the field. That would speed up the game alot. You would not need those HUGE goals (with boring games still ending tie 0-0) because the ball will move faster from a player to an other. That will really showcase the skills of the players in other words make the sport less diluted.

Also there are some rules that need to be changed. Hockey introduced a good rule to stop players from diving to fake the interference. To be honnest football is getting (keeps on being) ruined by divers. I watched the world cup final 2 years ago and it was really pathetic to see how diving is a big part of the game... To me this really kills the spirit of the sport.

Anyway there is no need to insult me im just giving feedback from an external POV.

good post really, won't insult you this time :D

FUCK YOU LOL

theres a six a side format thats quite popular. remembering seeing a six a side world cup. but it was boring as fuck. much much more boring than regular footie.

i guess u just have to be into the game a bit to like it. i dont think football is a game for the casual non playing fan. bit like cricket or baseball. for someone who doesnt play the game, its fucking ridiculous cos most of the time theres absolutely nothing happening on the field and even when something is happening only about 3 of the 10+ players are involved.

behold, the solution to your search:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6cjHDwuEzp0

indoor football is pretty much what you're talking about..

http://tubearoo.com/articles/34462/Simpson_Soccer_Riot.html

Currently there is a rather interesting column on spiegel.de regarding changes to football that would benefit the game without changing the essence of it. It's a six part series with the first three parts released.

It's in german, but google translate should get you the gist of it (sort of ;)). So far the guy has proposed some interesting and subtle changes.

http://74.125.43.132/translate_c?hl=en&ie...P_ijEtpUmg

http://translate.google.com/translate?u=http%...p;ie=UTF-8

http://74.125.43.132/translate_c?hl=en&ie...4jop3r62vg

can you make a summary, list the changes briefly?

1. for harmless fouls inside the penalty zone there shold be a free kick 20 m from the goal (direction of a line between goal and place of the foul). For harder fouls that would cause a penalty today, they should still give a penalty kick.

2. If some one it blocking the ball so it can roll off the field but does not touch it, the throw in or corner kick should go to the other team. The reasoning is that the player is in fact "controlling" the ball, just without actually touching it.

3. about the final minutes of a game and how everyone of the leading team is trying to buy time. He proposes to add a stop clock to make that last 15 minutes like e.g. basketball. So every ball out of bounds, every foul and every player switch the clock is stopped at the restarted once the ball is "free" again. Only do this for the last 15 minutes so games won't become uncontrollably long.


Imo all three are quite good ideas, with the third one being the most arguable one. Doubt we will see them being implemented though.

the 3rd is actually the most solid and easy to implement

1st is very abusable.. imagine players doing "harmless" (which is very hard to judge) fouls inside the penalty zone just to deny a good opportunity of scoring

2nd is absolutely retarded and uncalled for. those type of situations where a player protects the ball aren't very common or game breaking, PLUS it's messing with a fundamental rule of football: whoever touches the ball before it leaves the field, loses posession.

see my post, he propose to award penalties not to harmless fouls but to fouls which neglect the opposing team a chance at scoring

becks must have jsut skimmed the text :P

And regarding rule two, the proposed change only applies to the goal line. Situations in which the defender blocks the ball to prevent an attacker from reaching it are actually very, very common.

I read it.

but it was last week ;)

1. as syl said this is about fouls that woud otherwise be just ignored because they are not worth the penalty.

2. Maybe my desciption was bad, but imo it actually happens several times a game. and the reasoning is more difficult. Because you really are not allowed to simlpy block other players. But you may block them if you plan to control the ball.
Blocking to simply let the ball leave the field sucks for the attacker. I really don't see how it could be abused though.

It's called obstruction and is supposed to result in an indirect free kick (Or at least that's what we had to play in Sunday League :D) but that never gets given even when the situation is clearly actual obstruction so his proposal is actually really nice.

It forces teams to either play the ball and risk a tricky situation or give away a corner.

exactly. Aöways better when a native speaker describes it :P

He quotes fifa regulations that say that if the blocking occurs when the player has the ball in a controlable distance it's not to be penalized. It's that ruling that creates the contradiction

It's stupid really, a lot of the time the distance is quite large.

What becks said, but it makes sense to provide the reasoning as well.

1.
The goal of the penalty zone is to create an area infront of the goal which is mostly free of fouls due to the harsh sentence in which an offense results, i.e. the penalty shot.
The rules do not distinguish between normal fouls outside the penalty box, which result in a direct free kick, and fouls inside the box, which result in a penalty shot.
The rule accomplishes the opposite though. Because a foul inside the box results in an almost guaranteed goal, smaller fouls don't get punished at all by the referees (hence the term "penalty worthy foul" which he mentions in his articel). Just look at the amount of shoving and grappling that goes on at a corner shot.

He proposes a change similar to that in handball, as that a penalty shot is only awarded if the foul hindered a possible goal. If not, the attacking team is awarded a direct free kick 20 meters away from the middle of the goal line as becks said.

2. as becks said

3. as becks said :)

I'd go as far as to say that the last one is the least argueable one, as it would do away with lots of the current endgame shaninigans without changing the actual rules of the game as far as playing is concerned

The third one, for me is the worst.

Doing the same thing for the whole game wouldn't actually make the game all that much longer and would stop all the ridiculous stoppage time bullshit that happens every game and it would limit all the time wasting anyway.

Stoppage time is often purely up to the referees discretion, and strangely always ends up longer in close big games.

How often do Liverpool and Manchester United score an equaliser or winner in stoppage time? All the time.

over here the refs let the game go on until munich wins.