If your arm is outstretched you are making your body bigger. Your arm has to be in a natural position i.e. down by your side or in a reasonable position when jumping. There's no reason for your arm to be above your head or outstretched away from the body.
Have you ever tried jumping in the air to head a ball, Tom? Raising the arms is an essential part of the mechanics of humans jumping. Perhaps you would prefer football is played by robots, seeing as it already refereed by them?
Yes but not massively raised. Just for leverage. If you accidentally catch someone if the face with an arm when you jump it's a foul and a yellow card. So why shouldn't it be handball if the ball strikes your arm when you jump?
I refer you to the penalty given against Jack Stephens in the Burnley game, when his shirt was pulled downwards as he was in the process of jumping. 100% of human beings would automatically and unconsciously raise their arms in that situation, and Jack’s right arm was still below head height when the ball was headed downwards on to it. At the time you ascribed total blame for the penalty to Stephens’ incompetence, even though you acknowledged that Crouch was fouling him. That’s one example, but in general the point is that an arm raised “outside of the natural silhouette” in the process of jumping, or turning suddenly, will under the new ruling be liable to an automatic handball decision should it be struck by a ball from any distance. As I say, the rule change is making football a game that is impossible for any human in possession of at least one arm to play.
For me, the arm does not need to go over shoulder height when you jump. So I'd say as long as the arm is below the shoulder and it isn't too far away from the body that would be fine.
But in that case VAR (from next season) would probably give Saints a free kick (yes I was wrong about that one @fatletiss). I hold my hands up, I was wrong to attach 100% of the blame to Stephens. His arm was away from his body so it was a handball from the referee's point of view because he didn't see the foul.
And the general point of it being impossible to jump or turn without moving the arm or arms outside of your natural silhouette?
From next season the rule is and I quote from IFAB: "if the player's arms extend beyond a "natural silhouette", handball will be given, even if it is perceived as accidental". So your arm has to be in a natural position, otherwise it's a penalty.
So players will be discouraged from jumping or turning, or indeed moving at all? I sense Charlie Austin’s transfer value soaring next season!
Yes you have to move your arms but not to make your body bigger like an outstretched arm. You have use your arms to jump but there's still an expectation to keep them relatively close to your body.
Complete bullshit. What you’re saying is that it will still be subject to interpretation, which is the opposite of what you said before.
At the end of the day, the arm is not a legal part of the body in football. So it makes sense to tighten the handball law.
