Originally Posted by
the other bob wilson
Surely the point is that while there is a general acceptance that Zohore was offside at times in the move before the Newcastle player touched the ball, but at none of these times was he deemed to be offside by the official. The linesman was right in front of me and did not wave his flag until Zohore touched the ball, so he didn't believe there had been a foul, he clearly judged our player to be offside, hence I quoted the part of the law that it seems to me he applied to this incident.
You mention "grey areas". Time was when there was no such thing in football, the laws were clear and easy to understand for everyone and, although they may disagree at times with how they were applied by the officials, spectators were at least clear in the knowledge as to why a decision had been made.
There was a time under the old offside law where FIFA stated that any benefit of the doubt with offside decisions should be applied to attacking players rather than defending ones. For me, that was a change for the better and there was never any need for the complicated changes that have prompted around twenty posts in this thread arguing from different points of view without us still really knowing why the linesman raised his flag at the time that he did - more proof that the modern day offside law is an ass.