he doesnt have to carry it out, a player can be in touch, reach for a ball still within the field of play and as soon as he touches it (and he is in contact with the ground), the ball becomes in touch. This is not some new magical rule, this has been how it is for as long as i can remember

No it wouldn't have been play on as he had entered the field of play from outside the field of play (he was on the touchline).

Correct,
If a player is stood on the touchline he is considered to be part of the touchline i.e out of play. Saints in that case kicked the ball out of play. Head and feed to Hull.

The TJ got it wrong.

Had he have JUMPED I said! How can he out of play if he has jumped?

The only reason the ball was out of play was because he touched it with his feet on the touchline. I don't know if you're just stupid or winding me up!!!

that cannot be right! the player is considered to be out of play, but not part of the touchline, the emphasis is on the player to be in play or this (as chris saint alluded to) would be open to massive abuse

If he jumped from outside the field of play. IE, from having his foot on the line.

If he jumped and patted the ball and the ball was released before he hit the ground it would have been play on. The point i'm making is that the ball was still in play until it touched Whiting.

If he'd have jumped from in field. The point is that Whiting was in contact with the line immedialtly before he touched the ball. Rogues theory is that this essentially means he IS the line, so the ball went out from the kick, rather than being carried out by whiting.
It feels wrong in this situ, as if the fact the ball bouces should change the desicion, but unless a ref (and I've emailed Cummins's address from the sky sports website) tells me otherwise, I'm inclined to think it should have been Hull's head and feed.

It feels wrong but it may be right

Therefore Whiting is in touch in control of the ball. Either way it's a Saints head and feed. If he had received a pass from a Hull player and was stood on the line it would be a Saints scrum. If he had intercepted a pass and already had his foot on the line it would be a scrum to Saints. There is no difference. He caught the ball and was in touch at the same time in exactly the same way as he would if he'd received a pass. The ref was correct.

this is my understanding of it

So if, in a situation of a (half) break a saints player is stood with his foot on the line and the hull player [ipassed[/i it to him, you would deem the saints player to be the one to take it into touch, there for a hull scrum?

That, to me, feels right in the spirit of the game, but i can't help thinking that the written rules say different, implying if you hit a player who's in contact with the line, then you've essentially passed it into touch.

If you make a play for it then yes. How can it be any other way? If a Hull player passes it and your foot is on the line and you knocked it forward trying to recover possession are you saying that it should be my head and feed because I was out of bounds when I made a play for it? How can that be? There's a difference between being completely out of bounds and on the line surely? The game's rules should be interpreted towards the spirit of the game in conjunction with technicality because we already do that with high tackles i.e. a high tackle is considered to be such but then the spirit in which the high tackle was attempted is also included in a decision.

I don't know, I need someone with real authority to clarify it for, as its drving me crazy. I agree with you that in the spirit of the game the decison given on monday was correct and that the above situation would be farcical, but I just can't shake the fact I think the smallprint of the rules says otherwise.

Maybe it's that I don't read so well, but the written rule on the previous page didn't clarify it either way.

If he was stood on the line and a Hull player passed it to him, then it would be head and feed to Saints, as it was the Hull player who passed the ball who would have been deemed to have put the ball into touch as Whiting is out of play and is part of the touchline. It doesn't matter if it's an inch or a yard.

If he touches/catches a ball whilst out of the field of play from an opposing player then it's head and feed to his side (Hull in this case).

I got the info for Rogues from a mate of mine who refs at all levels (Not SL yet but he has run the line and done in goal touch judge etc at SL Games) as I like nearly everyone else thought it would be Saints Head and Feed.

He says as you have alluded to that if the player is in touch when he touches the ball then it is deemed that the ball has touched something "Dead" and that it is Head and Feed to the Defending team.
The same rule however does not apply in the "In Goal" area and if the ball is rolling in the field of play and the Defender touches it whilst he has a part of his body dead i.e Foot/Hand then he is deemed to have made it dead and it's a drop out.

Apparently they changed the in goal rule because of players straddling the dead ball line and touching the ball in the in goal to make it dead, they didn't change the touchline rule.

I agree with your sentiments about the "Spirit" of it but apparently thems the rules.
To be honest though I'm not sure how a defending team can benefit in many ways from this rule though and the scenario seems highly unlikely?
Although I suppose when a ball is bouncing towards the touch line and there is an attacker bearing down, rather than shepherd the ball out of play and risk the attacker getting it or touching it whilst in the field of play giving head and feed to the attacking team he could stand out the field of play and straddle the line and touch it? This would give head and feed to his/defending team.

Cheers JS they might believe me now.

I actually think it's quite simple. Which team was the last to touch the ball in the field of play?

I see Rogues has failed to acknowledge this post.

Let it go, it's done now.

So suppose the ball has been passed by a Hull player to the touchline and ends up resting on the floor. In attempting to get the ball a Saints player slides, misses the ball and ends up straddling the touchline with half his body over the line and half in play. Whilst straddling the touchline he grasps the ball. So what you're saying then is that the head and feed should go to Saints and not Hull. That's just ludicrous.

Similarly consider the same infraction behind Hull's goal line. A Hull player plays the ball backwards and it rests in the in goal area. With a Saints player straddling the dead ball lines would that be a scrum to Saints (or drop out against Hull) or would the Saints player be considered to have made the ball dead? I think the latter so why would you not consider it to be the same anywhere else on the field?

With regards to this ruling over the dead ball line didn't they change that a couple of years ago to stop this kind of questioning? I was pretty sure that if you caught the ball or picked the ball up and your foot was on the dead ball line you were deemed to have carried the ball over the line. Isn't that why they were questioning Briscoe collecting the ball behind the try line on Monday? Hadn't he placed a foot on the touchline when collecting the ball so they were saying it should have been a drop out? What's the difference?

The rules for dead ball line and touchline are different as Jukesays explained above. You can still catch the ball on the full with your foot outside the dead ball line from a kick off and get the penalty. What you can't do is stand with a foot over the deadball line and drag the ball over the dead ball line from an open field kick.

I'll have to read your first two queries later, but the second one is a virtual impossibility unless I have misread the situation.
How can the Hull player play the ball backwards 5 or more metres and how could a Saints player get over the dead ball line in that time?

As I said previously, who was the last player infield to play the ball? The other team will then get head and feed except for the 40:20 or the dead ball rule as above.

lets not get into the inprobably hypothetical situations and argue about who is correct.

Back to the issue - never a penalty and Ganson is a cheat, should nevere be allowed to ref a Stains game

A pathetic trolling attempt. At least it proves your a creature of habbit.

That's not the issue - the issue, if you bother to read the last few pages, was over a scrum and who's head and feed it was.

A decision more than likely given by the TJ.

Try and keep up.

phil clarke has always been bias against the teams that are a threat to wigan but at the end of the day he wigan through and through just like jamie redknap is for liverpool its how it is and theyve gotta either change it or we'll have to get used to it