Dutch Officials Discuss Abolishing Offside Rule in Effort to Reduce Amateur Football Violence

AMSTERDAM - The Netherlands football association is contemplating eliminating the offside rule in amateur matches in an effort to reduce the growing number of games being stopped due to conflicts arising from contentious decisions.

The Dutch football association (KNVB) said abolishing offsides at the lower levels of the game, where there are no KNVB linesmen but matches are rather flagged by club members, could lead to an end to the threats and violence that is on the increase in amateur football in the country.

KNVB director Jan Dirk van der Zee said they had to do something about the problem of fighting over refereeing decisions as the number of amateur matches that were stopped due to disorder has increased.

Last season, 1,864 matches were stopped because of violent incidents, an increase of 11% compared to the previous season and an increase of 58% over a five year period.

"It is true that it is a relatively small number compared to the almost 780,000 matches that are played annually, but we are not going to trivialise it," van der Zee told a press conference on Wednesday.

"We have a problem, and we want to eradicate it. I do not rule out that we will one day stop using assistant referees," he told reporters.