Kevin Pullein: Handball rule says Spurs goal was correctly awarded

Every time I listen to an argument about the handball rule I feel that nobody taking part has read it.

West Ham manager David Moyes was angry about Tottenham’s first goal in a 2-0 Premier League win on Tuesday. He said VAR should have disallowed it because the ball had touched Davinson Sanchez’s arm.

Every pundit I heard agreed with him. They said the rule is bad but according to the rule the goal should have been disallowed. I think they are half right. I think the rule is bad – because of what it requires in some other situations – but I also think that in this situation it required the goal to stand.

Moyes said: “The rules are that any handball that leads to a goal is disallowed.” I sympathise with him. That may be what he understood. The Premier League this season have issued statements about the handball rule that do not quote directly from it.

What the handball rule says is this: “It is an offence if a player … gains possession/control of the ball after it has touched their hand/arm and then … creates a goal-scoring opportunity”.

Sanchez did not gain possession/control of the ball after it had touched his arm. He did not contact it again. And anyway he did not create a goal-scoring opportunity. That must involve the ball going to a teammate who has a chance to score.

After the ball had touched Sanchez’s arm it went across the West Ham penalty area then Tomas Soucek tried to clear it but mis-kicked and instead scored an own goal. We do not talk about goal-scoring opportunities for defenders.

Best bet of the week

Under 6.5 Asian total cards in Athletic Bilbao v Mallorca
0.5pt 1.75 bet365

It is just possible that bet365 have underestimated the prospect of a low number of cards in Saturday's 1pm La Liga game between Athletic Bilbao and Mallorca.

Back under 6.5 Asian total cards at decimal odds of 1.75, equivalent to fractional odds of 3-4. Each yellow will count as one and each red as two.

The two biggest dangers to a low make-up are referee Pablo Gonzalez Fuertes and Mallorca. There are dangers to any bet, and it is better to be aware of them.

Gonzalez Fuertes is relatively new to La Liga. This season is only his third and this game will be only his 54th. But in the first and third of those seasons his cards per game ratios have been high for the division.

In only seven out of 15 games this season (47 per cent) has he shown fewer than 6.5 cards. Decimal odds of 1.75 imply a 57 per cent chance of a bet being successful. So at first glance there does not seem to be any encouragement for betting low. And even after looking deeper there will still be doubts.

Referees with high card counts in one period tend to move closer to the competition norm in the next. Usually, though, their card counts remain above that norm. And there is absolutely no guarantee when the process will start.

Mallorca’s games have often produced high card make-ups, though mostly because of their opponents, and more often at home than away. Altogether just 18 games out of 31 have yielded fewer than 6.5 cards – that's 58 per cent.

Mallorca start this game just below the relegation line, and six points behind the team just above it. There are seven games to go and we are approaching the stage of the season when their players could become increasingly desperate – whether the score is against them and they are trying to change it or the score is with them and they are trying to stop it from changing.

Athletic are in mid-table and realistically have little to play for.

The result-related odds imply a 64 per cent chance of an Athletic win, a 24 per cent chance of a draw and a 12 per cent chance of a Mallorca win. In a typical La Liga game with those result prospects fair odds about under 6.5 cards would be around 1.55. For this match they should be bigger, because of Gonzalez Fuertes and Mallorca. But it is possible that they should not be quite as high as 1.75. Keep stakes low, though.

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