Arm of the law

It's right to set high threshold for penalising handball offences

- Chris Foy

The referee Farai Hallam declined to award a penalty after the ball struck Yerson Mosquera's arm at the Etihad Stadium

(MARC ATKINS/GETTY IMAGES)

I refereed professional football for 25 years. We were talking about handball when I started and it remains one of the most discussed topics in the game.

One reason for this is that we’ve had a number of law changes by the International Football Association Board (Ifab) over recent years. All were made in an effort to achieve consistent outcomes for the benefit of the game, but we can sometimes end up with different interpretations of the laws.

There were two handball shouts in the biggest match of the weekend: Manchester United’s visit to Arsenal, overseen by the experienced referee Craig Pawson, who managed the game very well. He didn’t get involved unless he really had to, he let play flow and he’s rightly received plaudits for that. At the end, everyone was talking about the game, not the referee, and that’s all you can really ask for.