The Future of Handball Laws

Written by Grant Longstaff. Published 19 June 2026.

Why handball decisions cause so much discussion

Before we can look at the controversies we need to first look at the handball rules outlined by the FA (Football Association), the governing for football in England. The rules currently state the following:

For the purposes of determining handball offences, the upper boundary of the arm is in line with the bottom of the armpit. Not every touch of a player’s hand/arm with the ball is an offence.

It is an offence if a player: 

• Deliberately touches the ball with their hand/arm, for example moving the hand/arm towards the ball.
• Touches the ball with their hand/arm when it has made their body unnaturally bigger. A player is considered to have made their body unnaturally bigger when the position of their hand/arm is not a consequence of, or justifiable by, the player’s body movement for that specific situation. By having their hand/arm in such a position, the player takes a risk of their hand/arm being hit by the ball and being penalised.
• Scores in the opponents' goal:
  • Directly from their hand/arm, even if accidental, including by the goalkeeper.
  • Immediately after the ball has touched their hand/arm, even if accidental.

Just reading these rules might cause confusion and answers the initial question of why handballs can cause so much discussion. Ultimately, the rules allow room for interpretation.

The evolution of handball laws

Like any law, legal or otherwise, those surrounding a handball in football have changed and evolved with time. For a long time, the handball rule focused on whether or not the contact made with the ball was deliberate. However, how can you prove the intent of the player? The referee has to decide if a player’s actions were deliberate or not, which could be difficult at times.

The rules evolved and included the positioning of the player and his actions. Nevertheless, this still means the referee is having to determine intent. Is the player in an “unnatural” position? Is he using his arms to make himself bigger to block the ball?

The introduction of VAR (Video Assistant Referee) has also potentially muddied the waters. VAR gives referees the ability to review critical moments in a game of football which can aid their on-field decisions. However, does the increased scrutiny of a particular moment create a scenario where intent can be attached to a split-second action? 

Matthew Beecham, Programme and Student Lead in Academic Law, elaborates: “The handball debate is a classic example of what sports lawyers refer to as ‘lex sportiva’, the idea that sport operates through its own evolving body of rules, principles and methods of interpretation.

Much like a legal system, football's laws are drafted, amended, interpreted and applied by specialist institutions, yet they must also retain legitimacy in the eyes of those governed by them. To me, the repeated revisions to the handball law demonstrate that even within this autonomous sporting legal order, there are limits to what can be achieved through rulemaking alone. Greater precision may improve consistency, but it cannot eliminate the need for interpretation, judgment and an understanding of the spirit of the game. Which in turn demonstrates a problem familiar to every lawyer: the more you try to define every possible scenario, the more new grey areas you create.”

Handball Laws – legally speaking

With many of our faculty being legal experts we thought we’d ask for their views on the handball law as it currently stands.

Kelly Rowney, Senior Lecturer and the Campus Widening Participation Lead at our Leeds campus, said:

“I’m applying legal concepts to the handball rule just for the fun of it. I think it’s interesting that the rule uses the phrasing, ‘the player takes the risk’, which frames it similarly to recklessness. This could be linked to either criminal recklessness (although I doubt it here) or to civil negligence (foreseeability of harm). If you took the four requirements of negligence, duty of care, breach of duty, foreseeability of harm and causation, you could have fun with applying it to a handball scenario.”

Let’s take a controversial incident from the 2010 World Cup; a quarter final match between Uruguay and Ghana. Luis Suarez handled the ball on the line in the last minute and stopped a certain goal that would've given Ghana the win. Suarez received a red card and Ghana were awarded a penalty. But Ghana missed the penalty and Uruguay went on to win the game in a penalty shootout.

Kelly took the scenario and applied the four requirements of negligence, saying: “You could break down that Suarez likely owed a duty of care to play within in the rules of the game. Suarez breached that duty with a seemingly deliberate handball. The harm to Ghana is foreseeable, as he knows if his hand stops the ball, which was on its way into the net, it will stop the goal and direct causation seems clear. Though you might have to break all of this down a little more in an actual court of law, of course.”

Savvas Michael, Head of Student Dissertations and Research – AMIL, examined the final point in the FA’s rules, that it is a handball offence if a player scores in the opponents’ goal. He explains: “The controversial point here is that the goal must be 'directly from' or ‘immediately after' touching a player's hand/arm, even if accidental. But what if player A accidentally handballs it, then passes to player B who scores? According to the rules, as long as player A's body is not unnaturally bigger, and the handball is not deliberate, both of which can be subjective decisions open to interpretation from the referee and VAR, the goal would stand. But if player B accidentally commits a handball and then scores themselves, it would always be disallowed.

I think this partly relates to Kelly's point. To what extent should it matter that there is an additional player involved in the handball? Is the line of causation truly broken by this? Whether the player who assisted or scored the goal accidentally handballed it surely should not matter. How can the former be deemed lawful and the latter not, when the outcome is ultimately the same, i.e. a goal is scored?

There has been a lot of criticism of this new law and I think rightly so. It seems an attempt by the FA to create some legal certainty, but, in reality, logic has been lost as a result.”

Will we ever have handball rules we can agree on?

Angus Harrison, Senior Lecturer of Academic Law at our Bloomsbury campus, further unpacked the handball law:

"Handball rules inevitably involve the referee applying an element of judgment: for example, what does it mean for the player to have made their body ‘unnaturally bigger’? There will always be borderline cases in which different people will have different conclusions on this.

However, this is not altogether different from the law itself. Legal scholars have long drawn a distinction between ‘rules’ and ‘standards’ in law. An example of a rule is: Do not drive over 20mph. Whether a person has broken this rule has a straightforward, yes or no answer. However, a law making it an offence to drive ‘dangerously’ involves a standard, as there may be disagreement about exactly what counts as ‘dangerous’ driving.

Indeed, the legal philosopher Timothy Endicott argues that, despite their potential vagueness, the use of standards is an essential aspect of law. Because the law must regulate the whole gamut of human conduct in a general way, trying to make the law too precise would be counterproductive. It is not possible, for example, to list in advance every single way in which someone might drive ‘dangerously’ - and trying to do so would inevitably leave out some forms of driving which should be penalised and include others which perhaps should not be in certain circumstances.

Likewise, it would not be possible for the football authorities to list every body position which counts as ‘natural’ or ‘unnatural’. Trying to do so might create even more unfair outcomes. However, just as such standards leave plenty of room for lawyers to battle it out in the courtroom, they will always leave plenty for fans and armchair pundits to argue over, too."

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