Weekly refereeing review: 2–9 November 2026

The laws written for 2026/27 met a real Saturday. IFAB spent the week walking officials back through injury stoppages, a Step 5 friendly on RefChat showed players already arguing t

The laws written for 2026/27 met a real Saturday. IFAB spent the week walking officials back through injury stoppages, a Step 5 friendly on RefChat showed players already arguing the point, and the Premier League then offered three live tests of sequence and threshold: a hold on an offside attacker, a challenge judged reckless, and a hair pull at Everton. In the same few days English officials were on a Champions League pitch, in a Champions League VAR chair, and on the line at a World Cup bronze-medal match.

What officials should take from this week

If you stop play because an outfield player is injured, that player leaves and stays off for one minute of running time after the restart, even when they wave the physio away. A suspected head injury may be assessed on the pitch; the player then still leaves. Keep the exceptions you can actually defend: goalkeeper, a collision between team-mates or goalkeeper and outfield player, a severe injury, the taker of an awarded penalty, and a player hurt by a challenge you have already cautioned or sent off for.
Law 11 is a question of order. A player in an offside position who is fouled before playing the ball, attempting to play it, or challenging an opponent is fouled, and the foul is the restart. A player who is already doing one of those things, and is then fouled, has committed the offside offence first. Announce one restart, and let the sentence match it.
The yellow card is yours. VAR can send you to the monitor for a possible red card. A challenge the video official calls reckless stays without a card if you did not show one. On hair, split the questions: excessive force or brutality is the red-card test; a pull that affects the opponent can still be a foul.

The minute starts when you restart, not when they feel better

IFAB’s posts this week were match-control drills, not a new circular. On Monday it posed a careless tackle: the referee stops play, awards the free kick, asks the fouled player whether they need medical attention, and the player says no. On Tuesday it restated the head-injury sequence. Play stopped for an actual or suspected head injury may be assessed and treated on the field. The player must then leave.

The off-field treatment protocol is the text behind both posts. An outfield player leaves for one minute after the restart if you stopped because of an actual or suspected injury, if you called the medics on, or if you asked and they asked to be treated. Declining treatment keeps them on only when the injury was not the reason you stopped. The minute is a running clock, timed by you, and they re-enter with your permission: from the touchline if the ball is in play, from any boundary line if it is not. A substitution is not held up while that minute runs.

Circular 34 adds the head-injury point officials mix up with the “severe injury” exception. Assessment on the field is allowed. The player still leaves for a minute so the medics can judge whether it is safe to continue. A competition may allow a quicker return where the stop was brief, the injury is immediately clearly not severe, and little or no treatment was needed. If your competition has not written that down, you do not invent it on the touchline.

By Sunday night that exact wording was a 90-comment thread on RefChat. In New LoTG – Injuries, Dicky Herts reported a senior pre-season friendly, Step 5 against Step 7, in which the new requirement was already producing argument from players. The law he quoted back to the forum is the one in the protocol: stop play for the injury, or treat them on the field, and they leave for a minute after the restart.

Saturday takeaway. Say the reason for the stoppage out loud, to your team and to the player. “Stopped for the injury” means they go off for a minute however fit they claim to feel. “Stopped for the foul, and you do not want treatment” is the IFAB case in which they stay. Head injury: treat on the field, then they leave.

Source: The IFAB, Laws of the Game 2026/27 changes, RefChat.

Havertz was offside. The hold was still a decision

Arsenal beat Hull 1-0 on Saturday. The decision that travelled was at 42 minutes. Nobel Mendy pulled Kai Havertz’s shirt in the Hull box. Referee Farai Hallam played on. VAR Michael Oliver sent him to the monitor for a possible penalty. Hallam then told the Emirates, in the words carried by the Premier League match centre: “After review, there is a holding offence by Blue No 32 on Red No 29. However, Red No 29 is in an offside position, so the final decision will be a free-kick for offside to Hull City.”

Law 11 already separates those two facts. A player in an offside position who is moving towards the ball to play it, and who is fouled before playing it, attempting to play it, or challenging an opponent, is protected: the foul happened first, so the foul is penalised. A player who is already playing, attempting to play, or challenging, and is then fouled, has committed the offside offence first, so the offside is penalised. The restart follows whichever act came first. An offside offence is an indirect free kick.

On Match of the Day, former Premier League assistant Darren Cann told BBC Sport that the foul should have taken precedence and that the law is ambiguous. Dale Johnson’s reading of the VAR’s view was different: Havertz was the only Arsenal player who could become involved, so offside was treated as the fair outcome. Oliver had been in the middle at Porto on Wednesday. He was on VAR at the Emirates on Saturday. The law he and Hallam had to apply is the sequence above, and the sentence the stadium heard asserted a holding offence and an offside free kick in the same breath.

Saturday takeaway. Find the order, then choose one restart. If you are going to say “there was a hold”, be ready to award the hold, unless you can also say he was already involved in the offside offence before the shirt was pulled. “He was in an offside position” does not, by itself, answer it.

Source: Premier League and BBC Sport.

Bogle’s challenge was called reckless. The card never arrived

Leeds beat Tottenham 1-0 at Elland Road. At 34 minutes Jayden Bogle stepped on Mathys Tel’s left Achilles as he challenged. Referee John Brooks gave the foul and no card. Tel was treated and substituted before half-time. VAR Tony Harrington spent about four minutes on the replays and left Brooks on the pitch.

The match-centre audio, reported by the Premier League and by BBC Sport, was specific: “I’m confirming the on-field decision of no red card. There’s a lack of speed going into the challenge and he’s stepping into the tackle. Confirming a reckless challenge.” Reckless is a yellow card. VAR has no power to recommend one. Because the on-field decision was “no red”, and no yellow had been shown, Bogle finished the incident with nothing. Tottenham intend to write to Pro Ref asking why it was not a dismissal, Sky Sports reported.

The same half had a handball check on Mateus Fernandes. Harrington confirmed play on: the ball struck the top of the arm as Fernandes leaned, in the zone the Premier League treats as the shoulder. That one closed cleanly. The Bogle check closed on a word, “reckless”, which the on-field referee had not acted on.

Saturday takeaway. If the live challenge is reckless, show the yellow yourself. A long review that ends with “confirming a reckless challenge” cannot repair a missing caution. Use the delay of treatment to decide your card, not to wait for a red-card intervention that the threshold may never reach.

Source: BBC Sport and Sky Sports.

A hair pull can be a foul after it has stopped being a red

On Friday at Everton, James Tarkowski and Caleb Yirenkyi challenged for a cross. Stuart Attwell gave nothing. VAR Timothy Wood checked an alleged hair pull and a possible handball and cleared both. Coventry lost 3-1, and Frank Lampard’s complaint, reported by Sky Sports, was that he accepted it was not a red card and still thought it was a penalty. He said he was told it was a pull, but not enough of a pull. Yirenkyi, he argued, lost the momentum of the jump.

The Premier League’s summer guidance, quoted by Sky, is the working text. A red card is for a clear and deliberate pull with excessive force or brutality. A yellow is for a pull without that force or brutality. Officials were also told to penalise holding that has a clear effect on the opponent’s ability to play or challenge for the ball. BBC Sport took the view that Coventry probably should have had the penalty, and asked whether the check spent its time on Tarkowski’s hand rather than on the arm moving into the hair.

Saturday takeaway. “Not a red” is not a full decision. Judge force for the card, and judge impact for the foul. A deliberate pull that costs the opponent the jump is still holding, and holding in the penalty area is a penalty, with a yellow where the force stays short of brutality.

Source: Sky Sports.

Fifty Champions League matches, a first VAR, a bronze-medal flag

Pro Ref spent midweek publicising English teams in Europe, then marked a number. On Thursday it said Michael Oliver had become the first English referee to officiate 50 UEFA Champions League matches. The match was Porto against Napoli at the Dragão on Wednesday. Stuart Burt and James Mainwaring were the assistants, Thomas Bramall the fourth official, Stuart Attwell the VAR and Christian Dingert the assistant VAR, as reported when the appointment was made. Two days later Oliver was the VAR on Havertz.

The other English team was in Istanbul a night earlier. Chris Kavanagh refereed Galatasaray against Stuttgart, with Darren England as VAR for a Champions League match for the first time. BBC Sport told the road between the two facts. In 2023, as VAR, England said “check complete” on Luis Díaz’s goal at Tottenham and the goal stayed disallowed. He was out of Premier League selection immediately, back on the pitch almost three months later, and back in a Premier League VAR chair six and a half months after that. He has since refereed the FA Cup final, Manchester City’s 1-0 win over Chelsea, and been handed a plaque at Loughborough by Professional Referee Group director Hugh Dallas for his 100th Premier League match. UEFA’s ladder to Tuesday was ten Conference League appointments and six in the Europa League.

Nicoleta Bria’s week was on the line in Morocco. Pro Ref noted her as assistant referee for Korea DPR against USA in the U17 Women’s World Cup quarter-finals, then her appointment to the bronze-medal match, Korea DPR against Brazil, on 7 November, alongside referee Lara Lee. The appointment list has her as assistant referee 2 for both.

Saturday takeaway. England’s account of the Díaz match is the part worth keeping. Once he knew the decision was wrong he still had an hour of the game to officiate, and no way to leave the room. The Champions League appointment came after the Conference League and the Europa League, not instead of them. For an assistant, Bria’s bronze-medal match is what a solid quarter-final is for.

Source: Pro Ref and BBC Sport.

Kent’s mentor hubs won the night at Wembley

The County FA Recognition Awards were at Wembley on Wednesday, 4 November. England Football recorded 228 nominations. The Referee Development Award went to Kent FA for its Referee Mentoring Hubs.

Kent set up 10 hubs at community clubs, each led by an experienced official, so several trainees could meet in one place on the same afternoon. It trained 46 new mentors, added virtual mentoring, and saw 222 trainee referees use the hubs across 2025/26. Of those who joined from January 2026, 87 per cent received mentoring. Early retention is the figure that matters on a Sunday morning: 275 referees who qualified in 2025/26 had already reregistered. The night also recognised Norfolk’s Respect programme and Wiltshire’s youth work. The refereeing prize was for a structure a county can copy.

Saturday takeaway. If your county runs a hub, go before the next hard game, not after the appointment you are thinking of giving back. If you are the experienced referee in the clubhouse, Kent’s award is a job description: several new referees, one afternoon, and a number they can ring.