Mini Soccer rules for backpasses

Mini Soccer and back-passes to the Keeper

During the Girls u-12 game at Swindon on Sunday the ref awarded us a free-kick following a backpass to the keeper. Mike Buckland and myself were a bit puzzled where the ref decided the free kick should be taken. Consequently I have done some research so that I fully understand the rule. It looks as though the ref probably got it wrong, though I don't imply this was deliberate, merely that it is an interesting point. I certainly couldn't remember at the time what the rules actually say.

The rules, according to the FA Handbook 2004-5 are as follows:

Law 12

In Mini-Soccer all free kicks are direct

A free kick is awarded to the opposing team if the goalkeeper:
Touches the ball with his/her hands after it has been deliberately kicked to him/her by a team mate.
For this offence, the free kick should be taken from the penalty area line, parallel with the goal line, at the nearest point to the offence.

Note: this last section is under Law 12 but immediately follows the heading Penalty Kick, which is a bit confusing.

It appeared that the ref may have innocently made two "errors". He gave (a) an indirect free kick, instead of a direct one, and (b) he gave the kick outside the penalty area. I found a reference earlier somewhere that I can now not find again that said the kick should be 1.5m outside the penalty area, but I suspect this was for Futsal or some other small sided soccer variant. Alternatively maybe he gave it where he did thinking the offence is committed by the player passing the ball back to the keeper, not so.

So there you have it. If this arises again, or if you are refereeing a match, the rule is reasonably straightforward. Direct free-kick from the penalty area line (parallel to the goal line) at the nearest point to where the keeper picks up the ball. It would be worth reminding our refs about this (don't mean to be over-officious about this, just to clarify).

Its also worth remembering that technically there are 3 other offences that the goalkeeper can commit with the same result:

(1) Takes more than 6 seconds to release the ball from hands (hope no-one ever invokes this one, many of our keepers take an eternity to get rid of the ball)
(2) Touches the ball again with hands after released from possession and has not touched another player
(3) Touches the ball with hands after received directly from a throw-in taken by a team-mate

Hope this is helpful.