The NCAA News - News and Features

October 20, 1997

Card-carrying dilemma

System keeps soccer ethics high and misconduct in check, but it may lead to a mistaken impression that play is dirty

BY GARY T. BROWN
STAFF WRITER

When it comes to misconduct, soccer is caught between a rock-solid tradition and a hard-placed perception.

The sport's card system is perhaps more unyielding than misconduct rules in any other collegiate sport -- which keeps behavior clean. But in the public eye, that system may be projecting a perception of dirty play.

Soccer's deeply rooted ethical nature always has demanded stiff penalties for misconduct; thus the card system, in which players are yellow-carded and subsequently red-carded for playing-rules violations and/or for unsportsmanlike conduct.

Many of those violations, however, are akin to personal fouls in basketball or an offsides call in football. In soccer, those fouls can lead to a player's ejection.

This system has been embraced by the soccer community, and most coaches believe it works. But what the public sees are the yellow and red cards -- and player ejections for violations that are not as harshly penalized in any other sport.

Often, the public concludes that soccer has a misconduct problem that it in fact doesn't have.

Different from other sports

"What we consider to be misconduct in soccer is a lot different than in other sports," said University of Notre Dame women's soccer coach Chris Petrucelli, who has chaired the NCAA Men's and Women's Soccer Rules Committee for the last three years. "Standing five yards away from the ball on a free kick is something that could lead to you being suspended from the game. Standing five yards offside in football doesn't lead to you being suspended from the game."

In soccer, fouls such as encroachment during a free kick, delaying the game, certain types of obstruction and acts of dissent toward the referee can lead to that player being cautioned (yellow-carded). Any recurrence of those acts brings an ejection (red card), which suspends a player for the remainder of that game as well as for the next regularly scheduled game.

In addition, soccer's "accumulation system" means that a player's yellow cards do not go away at the end of the game. If a player accumulates five yellows during the course of the season, he or she sits the next game. Comparatively, basketball players who foul out have a clean slate for their next start.

Jim Dyer, assistant athletics director at the University of Maine, Orono, and a member of the National Soccer Coaches Association of America's (NSCAA) ethics committee, said that comparing soccer with other sports doesn't always produce an apples-to-apples equation.

"Some infractions in soccer may be technical in nature and some may be more serious," he said. "But an intentional foul on a breakaway in basketball may be just another foul, while that same type of foul would bring a yellow card or even an ejection in soccer.

"The punitive system is just different and maybe more stringent than in other sports. I think the thing that happens is that sometimes the general spectator makes comparisons with other sports where such comparisons aren't always warranted."

Accumulation system accepted

Cliff McCrath, the soccer rules committee's secretary-rules editor, said the accumulation system was implemented in 1990 primarily to curtail undesirable conduct not adequately addressed by the ejection policies. Because the caution penalties alone did not prompt a game suspension unless two were received in the same game, it was believed that players theoretically could choose their spots, be guilty of misconduct at least once per game and go the entire season without missing a game, providing the misconduct was a step short of an ejectionable offense.

McCrath said the system was considered restrictive and controversial when first introduced. Now, however, surveys indicate its acceptance -- and even point to a push for stricter penalties for misconduct violations.

Responding to coaches' concerns, the rules committee introduced for the 1997 season a two-game suspension for a player's second red card and any subsequent red card.

These penalties may beg the public-image question of whether potentially benching marquee players in order to curb behavior is a worthy trade.

"The system is definitely worth it," Dyer said. "Players have to understand that there are certain kinds of behavior that just aren't acceptable on the field."

"People who don't know our sport may feel that soccer has a behavior problem because all they see are the red cards," Petrucelli said. "But if you know our game, you know that just because you have a red card doesn't mean you punched somebody in the nose.

"I think it may be the most effective system in any collegiate sport because it's basically one chance and you're done. When you're talking about misconduct, I think the accumulation system is excellent."

Keeping track of cards

One problem inherent with the system, however, is administering it on a nationwide basis. Because player eligibility is involved, the card count becomes an important number, and in recent years, there have been accusations of inconsistencies in terms of recording cards.

Because coaches wanted to make sure the system was being administered fairly across the country, they asked for a clearinghouse that would provide teams with card information on upcoming opponents.

The NSCAA national office provided the clearinghouse for the 1997 season, posting players' card accumulations on its Web site. However, conferences, which were required to provide the information on a weekly basis, pulled the plug on the project earlier this month.

Michael A. Tranghese, commissioner of the Big East Conference and chair of the Collegiate Commissioners Association, said the commissioners believe it's more of an institutional than conference matter. He said that schools should be held accountable for ensuring that their coaches report their own activities as well as their players' activities to their opponents.

Other fundamental questions were posed as to whether such information should be so readily available at all.

"We're not posting unsportsmanlike conduct violations in football every week," said Colonial Athletic Association Commissioner Thomas E. Yeager. "And if we aren't alerting the referees as to the card status of players before each game (in accordance with the rules), why are we posting that information on the Internet? Seems to be inconsistent."

Losing trust?

As with other rules, the need for monitoring may draw a fine line between the demand for simple accounting and the desire for a watchdog.

"We're our own worst enemies here in that we have rules and we don't trust each other with them," Dyer said. "Certainly the sport has become more competitive; coaches are feeling now that because of some of the funding that's been directed toward their sport that they're experiencing more pressure to win. It's all part of the whole equation that has escalated the pressure on the coaches. They just want to make sure that their rivals aren't doing something that they're not allowed to do."

The method of recording cards nationally will be back on the table when the soccer rules committee meets in February. But the system itself seems to be in good shape.

"The most effective tool I think are the coaches and players who have respect for the laws of the game and respect for their opponents; that's the best monitoring system," Dyer said. "Short of that, we do have the help of the card system. Though I don't think we can rely on the card system for total responsibility, we're happy it's in place."

Even if it's a hard place.