No throw zone

[Donegal Hibby]

For all the football I’ve watched the last while I didn’t pick up on that the ball boys/ girls are no longer allowed to give the players the ball directly in order to take a quick throw and the players have to retrieve the ball from a cone or use the one in play that’s went out ..

I remember when we played Celtic at parkhead when LJ was manager the ball boys/ girls were always quickly on hand to give them and us back the ball immediately every time which I thought stopped us slowing the game down a bit and I thought they were well drilled on it , they even had one or two behind the goals to quickly give the keepers back the ball too ..

I think I read one time a hun player saying he once paid the ball boys / girls to take their time in giving the ball back in a game …

Interesting rule change though what I read about it stopping the home team getting an advantage with quick throws I’m not so sure it will stop a bit of time wasting as you regularly see a player going to take it and then leaving it for another player to take who might have a longer throw …

Good change or do you think it won’t make much any difference? .

[Greenbeard]

Could this be the start of football adopting some of rugby's common sense rules (or laws to be correct)?
LOng been the case in rugby that if you take a quick throw-in it has to be with the exact same ball that went out of touch and you have to have retrieved it yourself.
And it doesn't stop a quick throw-in sometimes being a considerable advantage.

[evy]

Could this be the start of football adopting some of rugby's common sense rules (or laws to be correct)?
LOng been the case in rugby that if you take a quick throw-in it has to be with the exact same ball that went out of touch and you have to have retrieved it yourself.
And it doesn't stop a quick throw-in sometimes being a considerable advantage.

Not only do you have to retrieve it yourself, it can't so much as have been touched by anyone else once it's in touch.

[Trinity Hibee]

Could this be the start of football adopting some of rugby's common sense rules (or laws to be correct)?
LOng been the case in rugby that if you take a quick throw-in it has to be with the exact same ball that went out of touch and you have to have retrieved it yourself.
And it doesn't stop a quick throw-in sometimes being a considerable advantage.

Not sure I agree with that. Don’t see the issue with a quick throw in football to speed the game up. It’s slowed down enough with the amount of fouls and simulation that goes on nowadays.

[Greenbeard]

Not only do you have to retrieve it yourself, it can't so much as have been touched by anyone else once it's in touch.
Aye. Well remember the bloke who was doing the Scotland subs on the touchline v. France a few years ago catching a high ball that had just gone into touch (and it was a good take) then all but handing-off the French player who came to get the ball looking to take a quick one. The look on the French player's face! IIRC the clip made it onto Question of Sport "what happened next".

[Viva_Palmeiras]

In my yoof I was a ball boy at Murrayfield. The debut of the Hastings bros in the Calcutta cup.

We won 33-6 - which used to be the biggest winning margin until about 10 years ago.

Colin Deans came into the dressing room to have a chat and impress on us the importance of cleaning and giving quick ball to the Scots whilst waiting til we were back to give to the English.

Reason? The previous ball boys in the opener against France gave them quick ball from a poor Scots kickoff which was quickly thrown to the great Serge Blanco who scored in on a solo run for a try.

The year - 1986…

[greenlex]

Aware of it but don’t agree with it. Quick ball boys for the home team should be part of home advantage. As long as they aren’t actively stopping the opposition from getting the ball it should be part of “the game’.

[Skol]

I wasn’t aware of it, but by coincidence I noticed it happening a few times on Saturday and thought that’s unusual. Is that just for 2025 or have I just not noticed before ?

[StirlingHibee]

Interesting - wasn't aware of that. Another rule I was not aware of was something I learned during the Arsenal v Man Utd cup game at the weekend. Man Utd had a player sent off so when the game ended up at a penalty shoot out, Arsenal had to remove a player from their team to make it equal 10 v 10. Amazing - you think you know the game inside out then find out something like this.

[ancient hibee]

That ruling has been in place down south for a while didn’t know it was in up here. Was it not supposed to be for health reasons?

[basehibby]

Presumably it's to prevent ballboys from giving preferential treatment to the home side and so prevent time wasting - eg if a ball boy were to deliberately be a slouch in feeding the ball. Seems reasonable to me as time wasting is basically a form of cheating whether committed on or off the pitch. The regulation now appears to be to have spare balls positioned on cones around the pitch so players can still get the ball in play quickly even if the clearance has gone into the stand - the game is still allowed to flow so seems a decent arrangement to me.

[zitelli62]

So if a player has to retrieve the ball from a cone and the ball boy's or girls are there what's to stop the ball boy throwing it back to the home team for a quick throw in but let the opposition pick it up from the cones that way you're not breaking the rules.

[RyeSloan]

So if a player has to retrieve the ball from a cone and the ball boy's or girls are there what's to stop the ball boy throwing it back to the home team for a quick throw in but let the opposition pick it up from the cones that way you're not breaking the rules.

Cause the rules are you can’t take the ball from the ball boy!

Think this all came about as teams were getting too smart with getting their ballboys to be quick for them and slow for the opposition. Ended up with a player pushing one of the ballboys in frustration…hence the rule change down south and now adopted up here.

That said I think Saturday was the first time I’d seen it in action at ER.

[basehibby]

So if a player has to retrieve the ball from a cone and the ball boy's or girls are there what's to stop the ball boy throwing it back to the home team for a quick throw in but let the opposition pick it up from the cones that way you're not breaking the rules.

That's the change the OP is pointing out - they're no longer allowed to do that.

[Radge70]

Josse Mourinho once gave a ballboy credit for an assist in a Champions League game at spurs. Slated his physio for attending to an injured player at Chelsea as well calling her naive as it meant the player had to leave the field rather than just roll about wasting time. Everyone is part of the team kind of thing - another good example here (physio clears the ball off the line - https://youtu.be/afhWQumYO24?si=Jz--lACs_r_ED5DS)

[PHeffernan]

https://queensparkfc.co.uk/multi-ball-system-changes/

[Keith_M]

Hearts had this black-art down to a tee for a while, where the ball boys at Tynecastle were returning the ball to the home team but not the visitors.

It's ridiculous they've had to enforce strict rules for this, but that's modern football.

[evy]

Hearts had this black-art down to a tee for a while, where the ball boys at Tynecastle were returning the ball to the home team but not the visitors.

It's ridiculous they've had to enforce strict rules for this, but that's modern football.

Lee Johnson also spoke about talking to the ball boys pre-match at ER about speed and I think actually training them in it as well (I could be making that bit up, though).

[Groathillgrump]

Lee Johnson also spoke about talking to the ball boys pre-match at ER about speed and I think actually training them in it as well (I could be making that bit up, though).

He probably told them to imagine they were being chased by Lions.

[overdrive]

Cause the rules are you can’t take the ball from the ball boy!

Think this all came about as teams were getting too smart with getting their ballboys to be quick for them and slow for the opposition. Ended up with a player pushing one of the ballboys in frustration…hence the rule change down south and now adopted up here.

That said I think Saturday was the first time I’d seen it in action at ER.

Noticed it at the Rangers game too. Well didn’t actually notice the ball boys not giving the ball to players but the cones were out and the balls on them, so it must have been in force.

Rocky went knocking the balls off the cones after one of our goals to slow down the restart.

[overdrive]

He probably told them to imagine they were being chased by Lions.

How will boy boys be able to show off their game IQ now :wink:

[ian cruise]

Lee Johnson also spoke about talking to the ball boys pre-match at ER about speed and I think actually training them in it as well (I could be making that bit up, though).

He did, and folk were pretty happy we were being a bit more street wise when it was first reported. Like many things of the Lee Johnson era, good ideas in practice but poorly executed.