{"id":108807,"date":"2026-04-01T13:48:33","date_gmt":"2026-04-01T17:48:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/?p=108807"},"modified":"2026-04-01T17:28:28","modified_gmt":"2026-04-01T21:28:28","slug":"opinion-taylor-mckee-and-michael-van-bussel-discuss-fifas-proposed-daylight-offside-rule","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/2026\/04\/opinion-taylor-mckee-and-michael-van-bussel-discuss-fifas-proposed-daylight-offside-rule\/","title":{"rendered":"Opinion: Taylor McKee and Michael Van Bussel discuss FIFA’s proposed \u2018daylight\u2019 offside rule"},"content":{"rendered":"

This piece written by Taylor McKee and Michael Van Bussel, Assistant Professors of Sport Management at Brock University<\/em>, originally appeared in The Conversation<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

After years of controversy over\u00a0marginal offside decisions\u00a0and the growing influence of\u00a0video assistant referees, FIFA is now testing a potential alternative.<\/p>\n

Starting in April 2026,\u00a0the Canadian Premier League will serve as a testing ground\u00a0for FIFA\u2019s proposed \u201cdaylight offside\u201d rule \u2014 a change championed by Ars\u00e8ne Wenger in his role as the organization\u2019s chief of global development.<\/p>\n

FIFA and the International Football Association Board typically test law changes in lower-profile competitions before considering wider adoption.<\/p>\n

Under\u00a0the proposal, an attacker is only offside if their entire body is completely ahead of the second-to-last defender. If any playable part of the attacker remains level with the defender, they are considered onside, effectively requiring visible \u201cdaylight\u201d between the two players for a flag to be raised.<\/p>\n

The CPL is not driving the change itself, but rather acting as a trial competition for a rule that could be adopted more widely if it proves successful.<\/p>\n

A rule under strain<\/strong><\/p>\n

The rules governing English soccer,\u00a0known as the \u201cLaws of the Game,\u201d\u00a0are set by the International Football Association Board and were first codified in 1863, including an early version of the offside rule. Since then, there has only been\u00a0two major changes, in 1925 and 1990.<\/p>\n

That relative stability changed in the 2010s with the introduction of the\u00a0video assistant referee (VAR). For the first time, an additional referee, not located on the pitch, was endowed with the authority to review and overturn decisions on goals, penalties and red cards.<\/p>\n

Offside has become\u00a0one of VAR\u2019s most scrutinized uses, with decisions often determined\u00a0using calibrated lines and multiple camera angles\u00a0to identify the exact position of players at the moment the ball is played.<\/p>\n

The impact has been significant. In the Premier League alone,\u00a034 goals were nullified for being offside last season.<\/p>\n

Precision versus perception<\/strong><\/p>\n

The\u00a0subjectivity of the offside rule\u00a0has been a topic of debate among fans since its inception.<\/p>\n

VAR was introduced to promote transparency from referees and counter\u00a0claims of unfairness, but it has arguably\u00a0produced even more controversies.<\/p>\n

Resistance to VAR has been steadily increasing\u00a0in academic\u00a0and public circles, leading to\u00a0calls for change.\u00a0Some research suggests\u00a0that the offside rule is not only difficult to enforce but \u201csystematically vulnerable to perceptual error.\u201d<\/p>\n

Especially in the face of major tournaments and high-pressure matches, tensions towards VAR and the offside rule have been heightened to an even greater level. The consequences of this can be seen\u00a0within fan engagement and across social media.<\/p>\n

The \u2018offside trap\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\n

For decades,\u00a0the \u201coffside trap\u201d\u00a0was a defender\u2019s best friend. By stepping forward in unison, defenders could catch strikers out by a matter of inches, effectively killing an attack before it even started.<\/p>\n

This allowed teams to play a \u201chigh line,\u201d pushing the action far away from their own goal. Wenger\u2019s proposal essentially breaks that trap, as strikers can now be almost a full body length ahead of the defence and still be onside.<\/p>\n

If a defender tries to catch a striker offside and fails, they are left in a foot race they\u2019ve already lost by two metres. As a result, we expect what some have described as the \u201cdeath of the high line.\u201d<\/p>\n

In response, teams may shift toward a \u201clow block,\u201d sitting much deeper and closer to their own goalkeeper. By \u201cparking the bus\u201d and removing the open grass behind them, defenders can negate the striker\u2019s new head start.<\/p>\n

The game may become higher scoring, but it will also force a more cautious, safety-first style of defending.<\/p>\n

More clarity, or more controversy?<\/strong><\/p>\n

If the daylight rule is seen to improve clarity, increase attacking play or reduce controversy, it could be introduced more broadly in the coming years. If not, it may merely remain an experimental footnote.<\/p>\n

However, the daylight rule is unlikely to resolve existing concerns about VAR. If anything, it may extend ongoing\u00a0debates about consistency and legitimacy\u00a0in offside decisions.<\/p>\n

Questions will remain about how \u201cdaylight\u201d is judged in practice, particularly in fast-moving situations or when bodies overlap at angles.<\/p>\n

Pundits, journalists and professional soccer players will continue to assess whether this rule simplifies \u201cthe beautiful game\u201d or hinders it. Public reaction on social media is also likely to remain mixed, and any discussions will shape collective views on the rule\u2019s effectiveness.<\/p>\n

Ultimately, the effectiveness of this new rule may come down to the subjectivity of referees. Soccer and offside calls will always come down to the mere millimetre, no matter how substantially the gap is widened.<\/p>\n

A moment of opportunity for Canada<\/strong><\/p>\n

Beyond the technical change, the trial could matter a lot for how the CPL is regarded more broadly. It gives the Canadian league a chance to be part of an international conversation in a way smaller leagues rarely get the opportunity to do.<\/p>\n

That alone could raise the CPL\u2019s visibility and make Canadian domestic soccer more relevant in discussions about where the global game is headed.<\/p>\n

In that sense, the bigger implication is about whether the CPL can use this moment to strengthen its place in the wider football world. For a league that\u2019s still building its international profile, that kind of attention could matter just as much as what happens on the pitch.<\/p>\n

This article was co-authored by Wai Leung, Gaetane Slootweg Allepuz and Agrim Gautam, undergraduate students at Brock University and members of the Brock University Centre for Sport Capacity Soccer Working Group.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Taylor McKee and Michael Van Bussel, Assistant Professors of Sport Management at Brock University, recently published a piece in The Conversation about a proposed new FIFA offside rule that will be tested by the Canadian Premier League starting in April 2026. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":108808,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[36,6],"tags":[28,4753,7488,10138,57,10657,5512],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108807"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=108807"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108807\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":108814,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108807\/revisions\/108814"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/108808"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=108807"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=108807"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=108807"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}