He is the last runner-up in the NBA Finals. The clock reads 0.0 in a one-point game, but the game continues for a few seconds as the Golden State Warriors drive to the rim.
The fight at Madison Square Garden goes to the end. The final bell rings in the 12th round, but the referee does not stop Oleksandr Usyk’s advance, with the Ukrainian boxer close to the knockout.
There is one lap left in the Formula One World Championship and in a winner-take-all situation, the race director refuses to release the control flag because second place is catching up to the leader. In fact, After the controversial end of the 2021 season, Maybe that’s not the best example.
However, the point still stands. The circumstances mentioned are ridiculous: every major sport has a clear ending, whether it’s an expired game clock, the final shot, or a match point. They are objective, not subjective.
Football is an exception and the final moments of Real Madrid’s 2-2 draw in Valencia on Saturday night exposed its limitations.
This is what happened.
Bellingham and other players surround the referee after the decision (José Hernández/Anadolu via Getty Images)
Seven minutes of stoppage time arrived on the fourth referee’s board. After that, there was a two-minute delay when VAR overturned a penalty initially awarded to Real. The visiting team’s hair stood on end on an emotional night: winger Vinicius Junior had previously scored two goals in a stadium where he was subjected to racist abuse the previous season.
The delays caused the match to continue until the 99th minute and when Luka Modric stepped up to take a Madrid corner, referee Jesús Gil Manzano signaled that this would be the last play of the match.
Valencia cleared, but only to the edge of the area. As Madrid winger Brahim Díaz prepared to return the ball, Gil Manzano blew his whistle. Game over.
Less than a second later, Díaz launched his cross. The referee’s whistle had not yet been registered by the players waiting for it. Jude Bellingham, who has scored 16 goals in La Liga this season, headed in. As he walked away celebrating, he and Madrid thought this was the winner, another special moment in his spectacular debut season.
Gil Manzano was determined. No goals. Bellingham rushed the referee along with captain Dani Carvajal, Vinicius Jr, Joselu, Andriy Lunin and Antonio Rudiger.
“It’s a damn goal,” Bellingham yelled at Gil Manzano, and he was sent off. In statements after the match, Carlo Ancelotti supported his player.
“Bellingham didn’t insult the referee, he said in English: ‘It’s a damn goal,’ which is what we all thought,” said the Madrid coach. “He approached the referee, but given what happened, that was quite normal.”
Madrid’s official website called it an “unprecedented refereeing decision,” but according to the letter of the law, they had no case. Gil Manzano had played enough stoppage time and signaled his intention to finish the game and the final whistle means the game is over. Without ifs, goals or maybes.
The anger arose from one of football’s unwritten laws: that when a team is attacking, the final whistle must not be blown.
“The ball is in the air. What the fuck is that?” Bellingham appeared to say during his protests. Looking back, Gil Manzano’s first whistle came before the ball was released; the second and third occurred with the ball in the air, but before Bellingham headed it. Only the first whistle is needed to stop the game.
Soccer regulations are vague about when exactly a referee should blow his whistle. According to the International Football Association Board (IFAB), the sport’s legislators, the referee “acts as timekeeper,” “the referee may increase the extra time, but not reduce it,” and “the award for lost time depends on the discretion of the referee.”
IFAB Law 5.2 adds: “The referee cannot change a restart decision upon realizing that it is incorrect if the referee has signaled the end of the first or second half.”
This confusion has led to a subjective system. The game has developed in such a way that the expectation is that the half should not end if one team is on attack, but without this being codified the referees may interpret it differently, if they recognize it at all.
What constitutes being on the attack? About to shoot or cross? What if there is a transition opportunity? What if a player has a clear run towards the goal from behind to halfway? Is 60 seconds of patience from the edge of the box, a la Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City, an attack in progress?
All other elements of football are strictly regulated. The IFAB Laws of the Game are a 230-page document. Six of those pages, including diagrams, are dedicated to what constitutes handball. Why is one of its most important elements (when a game ends) barely worth a mention?
After posting about this on X, formerly Twitter, some responded saying the law was clear: the game ends when the whistle blows. So what is the reason for the widespread anger? Others responded by saying that this was only a problem because it happened to Bellingham and Real Madrid, but this is not the first time it has happened. It was only a matter of time before it happened again in a high-profile, high-stakes match.
Going back to the 1978 World Cup, Welsh referee Clive Thomas missed full time with a Brazil corner in the air during a group stage match against Sweden, disallowing a Zico header that would have given Brazil a victory. for 2-1. The decision meant they only finished second in their group, putting them in a tougher group in the second round, from which they failed to qualify for the final.
In January 2021, Paul Tierney missed the break a few seconds before his allotted minute of stoppage time was up. Liverpool, playing against Manchester United in a crucial Premier League match, had the ball behind them until halfway through the game, but Sadio Mane seemed to have managed to score. He would not have been able to put the ball in the net before the clock struck the 46th minute.
A month later, Craig Pawson refereed Manchester United’s trip to West Bromwich Albion. With the score at 1-1 and the clock at 47:07 after two minutes of stopped time, United came out of their own half, with four attackers against just one West Brom defender. Pawson missed with the ball still 70 meters from the opposition goal and was surrounded by angry United players.
The most egregious thing was that in November 2017, Ponferradina of the Spanish second division thought they had a late goal that would take them out of the relegation zone, but referee Álvaro López Parra failed when Andy Rodríguez passed the ball over the opposing goalkeeper .
Gim. Segoviana – Ponferradina (0-0): it was annulled in Ponfe in the final match. The ball came into play after the final whistle (via @rtvcyl) pic.twitter.com/zgUlU7z9E8
— El Partidazo de COPE (@partidazocope) November 2, 2017
The laws allow for subconscious bias, the possibility of home teams or favorites getting more chances, and inconsistency, where referees interpret what constitutes an attack differently.
Visit arbitration forums and the same problems arise. Dozens of rank-and-file officials tell stories of being surrounded after working full time. Your decision is final, but subjective. People don’t agree.
“It is less aggressive, believe me, to attack a neutral situation,” wrote one referee, explaining a controversial incident. “But it’s not always necessarily the right thing to do.”
It doesn’t have to be like this.
The IFAB annual conference took place last week in Scotland. There, in football we talk about permanent and temporary substitutes for concussions, accidental handballs and intrusions during penalties. What else could they have discussed if full time had been on the agenda?
Soccer has some challenges. Due to further interruptions after the 90th minute (injuries, substitutions, celebrations, loss of time), referees cannot simply blow up the second the clock reaches the end of the allotted stoppage time.
If football had a system where the clock stopped when the ball was out of play, matches would be extended to an unprecedented length: the typical ball-in-play time in the Premier League is approximately 55 minutes.
However, under the current system, teams complain if the whistle blows while they are on offense. In the midst of this indistinction, no one is happy.
A simple adjustment could help. During injury time, the referee could switch to a stopped clock system and blow exactly the minute. For example, if a team scores after the referee has indicated that there would be a four-minute stoppage of time, the referee could stop time, before restarting it when the ball is in play, and exploding at exactly 94.00. All professional stadiums have clocks that show the exact time, so players can keep track.
It gives objectivity to the law, allows interruptions after the 90th minute and, by being implemented only in injury time, means games will take no more than two hours to complete. It is not a complete novelty in the sport: futsal already has a designated timekeeper and a strict full-time whistle.
Bellingham’s ‘goal’ should not have stood, but the vagueness and limitations of football laws put the referees in a difficult position. The game is already difficult enough to control. It is not about changing a rule, but about introducing basic clarity.
(Main photos: Getty Images; design: Dan Goldfarb)
