Do you know about the International Football Association Board (IFAB)? I was only vaguely aware of them until I read a link in yesterday’s Daily Dose about the possibility of sin bins being introduced to football. But turns out they meet once a year and decide on how football is played.
I did a bit of research into the IFAB, and here’s the lowdown: It’s made up of eight representatives - one from each of the four UK football associations and another four from FIFA. And if six out of those eight vote in favour of a rule change, then that’s how we all play football from there on out. Pretty damn powerful.
Even FIFA’s own description of IFAB contains this sentence:
While the International F.A. Board is by no means a mysterious institution, it does have a somewhat secretive aura.
Wow.
I know what you’re thinking: Why do the four UK football associations have so much power? Well, the IFAB first met in 1882, so that the four UK associations could agree on a set of laws for when they played each other.
FIFA came along in 1904, and agreed to play by the rules that IFAB had agreed on. That tradition has continued, only now FIFA’s four votes mean the UK associations can’t just dictate to the rest of the world. Otherwise they could have passed an emergency rule to qualify one of them for Euro 2008…
The IFAB meets on February 28th this year, and here are the pretty radical things they’ll be proposing:
1. Sin Bin - as used in ice hockey and rugby. For minor offences that don’t warrant a red card, a player would have to leave the field and sit in the sin bin for five or ten minutes, giving an obvious advantage to the opposition.
2. Four subs - Sounds radical but it’s really not. Remember there used to be no subs, then teams were allowed one sub, then two and now three. With the size of squads today, and the pace of football, I think this would be a pretty good idea.
3. Clarification of offside - Remember when Ruud van Nistelrooy was judged to be offside at Euro 2008 because Christian Panucci was off the pitch? The law could be changed to make sure that never happens again.
4. Extended half-time - Right now it’s 15 minutes between halves, but the IFAB will discuss extending that to 20 minutes. Apparently this is because the dressing rooms are so far away in new stadiums that players spend most of halftime getting there. This would work for me because I always seem to miss second half kickoff while cuing for a drink.
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Bit of drama in the tunnel following the 
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