10 football rules you didn't know existed

#7 You cannot be offside in your own half

Why is there an offside rule? It is there to prevent the attacking team from parking on of its players near the opponent goal. If there was no offside rule, we might very well call this sport 'Airball' instead of football because there would be no defense-splitting through balls, perfect crosses and timed runs. Now, where would be the fun in that?

If a player receives the ball in his own half and he is in an offside position when the pass was made, it essentially means that the team in its own half has not kept one of its players waiting near the opponent goal. So, in this case not calling offside, even though the player receiving the ball is nearer to the goal than the ball and second-last defender, would not defeat the purpose the offside rule was made for.

Of course, this only holds when the player receiving the pass has not crossed the halfway line when the pass is actually made.

#6 Goalkeepers may wear tracksuit bottoms but not others

This is also straight-forward and needs no explanation. And to be frank, I wouldn’t fault you if you think it would look ridiculous if a single player on the pitch wears a tracksuit while the others are in shorts because I share your thought.

And when you talk about goalkeepers wearing tracksuit bottoms, you cannot leave out René Higuita, the former goalkeeper of the Columbian nation team, also known as El Loco. He is mainly famous for two things now: his tracksuit bottom and an incredible, audacious scorpion kick save against England in a friendly. And he did it wearing a tracksuit bottom! Watch the amazing feat here.

#5 A player can be sent off even before the match starts

This rule was introduced quite recently, in 2016 in fact, to prevent any offences like fighting between players in the tunnel before the match starts. This is mentioned in The FA Laws of the Game – Law 3 The Players.

You might have known this but let us see the nitty-gritty of the rule here:

"If a player is sent-off before the team list has been submitted to the referee, he cannot be on the team in any capacity for that match. Though a replacement player can be brought in from the reserves if the team has any."

"If a player who has been named on the team list submitted to the referee is sent-off before the match he can be substituted by a player from the bench if he was in the playing 11 and the substituted player cannot be replaced. If the sent-off player is not in the playing eleven, then the team simply has to play the match with one less substitute on the bench. Though the number of substitutions the team can make remains the same."

Remember that Patrice Evra karate kick? In an incident reminiscent of another United player Eric Cantona, the full-back, who was playing for Marseille at the time, launched a kick on one of his own team’s fans before the start of a Europa League match. Consequently, he was sent off. As he was already named as a substitute on the team list submitted to the referee, he was not replaced during the match and Marseille had to play with one less substitute on the bench.