Football Lawmakers Propose 10 Minute Sin Bin Rule to Curb Players’ Dissent on Referees

• Players might have to be careful in subsequent seasons with how they relate to referees
• The laws of football might be altered to introduce far-reaching consequences for dissent
• IFAB will debate the possibility of introducing a 10-minute sin bin to protect the referees

The body responsible for coming up with the laws of football, the International Football Association Board (IFAB), is considering introducing new changes to how players' abuse of referees is dealt with.

This season has seen Premier League referees cracking down on dissent from both players and managers, with any form of disagreement being met with a booking.

The Times now reports that IFAB is planning to introduce a 10-minute sin bin to protect referees from abuse.

A sin bin is popularly used in rugby. As the BBC reports, this is a bench where all players who have committed a yellow card offence sit out of the game for 10 minutes.

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IFAB will also discuss the possibility of adopting a 'captain's approach rule' where only the team's skippers will be allowed to address the referee.

IFAB aims to clamp down on misbehaviour

The Chief executive of IFAB, Lukas Brud noted that the abuse of officials is one of the main issues affecting the game.

"We have identified participant misbehaviour as a major problem for football, and it will be the main topic for IFAB for the upcoming years. We are looking at what we can do either via the Laws of the Game or recommendations and guidelines for additional measures."

GOAL adds that 88 yellow cards have been fished out for dissent this season alone.

What offside technology does the VAR currently use?

As previously explained by Sports Brief, officials use Hawkeye virtual offside line technology to arrive at decisions. This is broken down into the gridline and the crosshair.

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The former is straightforward, with a line being drawn at the last defender. Any opposing player who is over the line and headed towards the goal is deemed as offside.

But at times, the gridline fails to outrightly differentiate whether the attacking player is in a legal position to play the ball or not - this is when the crosshair is introduced.