Soccer Rules-Fouls- Spitting

At a soccer match, most acts become fouls only by degree. The player?s actions during the run of play are, in large measure, harmless in themselves, and will become fouls only when done in an unfair manner. Players often bump into each other while running, or push past each while each is trying to avoid a collision. They tussle over the ball, or leap to head a long pass and collide another player who is trying to do the same thing. They may kick at the ball and narrowly miss kicking their opponent?s shin. These actions are all considered to be an ordinary part of the typical soccer game, where most bodily contact is incidental to the players? efforts to win the ball.

A few acts, however, are deemed fouls whenever they take place?regardless of how or why they occur. One kind of worst of these acts is the foul and misconduct of spitting.

Spitting
Though it has probably been with us ever since Adam and Eve first left the Garden of Eden, spitting is particularly frowned upon away from the athletic field, where it is considered the act of a barbarian. But though always vulgar, spitting is regarded in some cultures as a particularly vile and offensive insult. For this reason, spitting at anyone during the course of a soccer match is a red-card offense; and spitting at an opponent during play is a foul as well as a misconduct, punished by a direct kick as well as a send-off.

Referees are, however, careful to punish the misconduct, and not simply the vulgar. Like many athletes, soccer players have an unfortunate tendency to spit quite innocently, occasionally on indoor carpets as well as natural grass. But despite what their mothers might have to say about the matter, on a soccer field only spitting at another person is a misconduct.

Jeffrey Caminsky, a veteran public prosecutor in Michigan, specializes in the appellate practice of criminal law and writes on a wide range of topics. Both his science fiction adventure novel The Star Dancers, the first volume in the Guardians of Peace (tm) science fiction adventure series, and The Referee?s Survival Guide, a book on soccer officiating, are published by New Alexandria Press, http://www.newalexandriapress.com.