A foul, a restart and a card are separate decisions.

The ruleset used on this page

This page applies The IFAB Laws of the Game 2026/27, principally Law 12 (Fouls and Misconduct) and Law 5 (The Referee). The edition took effect on 1 July 2026, although a competition beginning before that date could implement it earlier.

This is the worldwide association-football baseline, not a league's suspension tariff. A competition may add authorised procedures such as VAR or, at specified lower levels, temporary dismissals. Its regulations also decide later bans, fine systems and card accumulation across matches.

How to analyse the incident

1. Was the ball in play? A free kick or penalty can only be awarded for an offence while it is in play.
2. Identify the actual offence. Legal contact, a direct-free-kick foul, an indirect-free-kick offence and misconduct are different categories.
3. Fix the location. For a defender's direct-free-kick offence inside their own penalty area, the restart is a penalty kick.
4. Judge physical severity. Careless, reckless or excessive force applies where Law 12 uses that ladder.
5. Test tactical effect. Decide whether the offence stopped a promising attack or denied an obvious goal-scoring opportunity.
6. Check separate misconduct. Dissent, simulation, persistent offences, delaying a restart and violent conduct have their own sanctions.
7. Apply advantage, quick-restart and competition rules. These can alter when or whether a tactical card is shown.

Contact does not automatically mean a foul

Law 12.1 awards a direct free kick when a player charges, jumps at, kicks or attempts to kick, pushes, strikes or attempts to strike, tackles or challenges, or trips or attempts to trip an opponent in a careless, reckless or excessively forceful manner. Fair shoulder-to-shoulder contact while the ball is within playing distance can remain legal; the fact that an opponent falls is not itself a test.

Holding, a punishable handball offence, biting or spitting, throwing an object, and impeding with contact are also direct-free-kick offences. They do not all require the careless-reckless-excessive-force ladder before the referee can award the kick.

Indirect does not mean unimportant

Law 12.2 gives an indirect free kick for playing dangerously without contact, impeding an opponent without contact, verbal offences, preventing the goalkeeper from releasing the ball and specified goalkeeper-handling offences. If a dangerous high foot makes punishable contact with an opponent, the restart is instead a direct free kick or penalty kick and the referee judges the severity of the challenge.

The type of kick comes from the offence, not the colour of the card. An indirect-free-kick offence can still be cautionable for recklessness or SPA, or a sending-off offence if it is DOGSO.

Careless, reckless and excessive force have mandatory consequences

• Careless: lack of attention or consideration, or acting without precaution. Award the foul; no card is needed for carelessness alone.
• Reckless: disregard for the danger to, or consequences for, an opponent. The player must be cautioned.
• Excessive force: exceeding the necessary force and/or endangering an opponent's safety. The player must be sent off.

The Laws set thresholds, not a numerical checklist. Speed, force, control, point and mode of contact and the action as a whole are evidence from which the referee judges those thresholds. Touching the ball first does not legalise the follow-through.

Serious foul play is not the same as violent conduct

Serious foul play is a tackle or challenge for the ball that endangers an opponent's safety or uses excessive force or brutality. Violent conduct is excessive force or brutality when the player is not challenging for the ball, or when the target is a team-mate, team official, match official, spectator or another person. An attempt can be violent conduct even without contact.

The distinction describes the offence, not a different card: both require sending-off. It matters for accurate reporting and for the competition's later disciplinary process.

Misconduct is wider than physical contact

A player can be cautioned for dissent, delaying the restart, failing to respect a restart distance, persistent offences, unsporting behaviour, entering without permission, entering the referee review area or excessively making the review signal. Simulation is unsporting behaviour even when no opponent committed a foul.

Sending-off offences also include biting or spitting, offensive, insulting or abusive language or actions, a second caution in the same match and entering the video operation room. A card communicates discipline; it does not prove that the restart is a direct free kick.

Tactical impact is judged separately from force

Stopping or interfering with a promising attack (SPA) is normally cautionable unsporting behaviour, subject to the penalty-area, advantage and quick-free-kick exceptions below. DOGSO is normally a sending-off offence because an obvious opportunity, not merely a promising attack, was denied.

For DOGSO, Law 12.4 requires the referee to consider the distance from the offence to goal, the general direction of play, the likelihood of keeping or gaining control of the ball, and the location and number of defenders and attackers. The 2026/27 edition expressly added attackers to that list. “Last defender” is not the legal test.

A penalty kick does not automatically turn red into yellow

If a defender commits DOGSO against an opponent inside the defender's own penalty area and a penalty kick is awarded, the defender is cautioned only when the offence was an attempt to play the ball or a challenge for the ball. Holding, pulling, pushing, or an offence with no possibility of playing the ball remains a sending-off.

The same logic does not excuse dangerous conduct. If the challenge also constitutes serious foul play, the player is sent off for that more serious offence. For SPA in the penalty area, an attempt to play or challenge for the ball carries no SPA caution when a penalty is awarded, but an independent reckless challenge still requires yellow.

Intent and location change the sanction

A player who denies a goal or obvious opportunity by deliberate handball is sent off wherever the offence occurs, except for a goalkeeper handling inside their own penalty area. A punishable but non-deliberate handball DOGSO outside the offender's own penalty area is also red; when the referee awards a penalty for non-deliberate handball DOGSO, the defender is cautioned instead.

Ordinary handball does not carry an automatic card. The referee must identify a separate Law 12 reason such as SPA, DOGSO or an attempt to score using the hand or arm.

Playing on can remove a tactical card, but not dangerous misconduct

Under Law 5.3, the referee may return to the original offence if the anticipated advantage does not arise at that time or within a few seconds; the original restart and sanction then apply. If advantage restores a promising attack, there is no SPA caution for the tactical offence. If the referee lets a realised advantage continue after DOGSO but no goal results, the offender is cautioned at the next stoppage rather than sent off for DOGSO.

New for 2026/27: if the non-offending team scores as a result of advantage after a DOGSO offence, there is no disciplinary sanction for that DOGSO. A separate reckless offence, serious foul play or violent conduct is not erased. Advantage should not be used for serious foul play, violent conduct or a second caution unless there is a clear opportunity to score.

The chance to restart can also change a tactical card

Once the referee starts the card procedure, play generally waits until the sanction is administered. An exception allows the non-offending team to take a quick free kick into a clear goal-scoring opportunity before that procedure has started.

The card is then shown at the next stoppage, except that a DOGSO offender is cautioned rather than sent off and an SPA offender receives no SPA caution. Any separate reason for discipline still applies.

A card after the whistle does not rewrite the restart

If the ball is already out of play, the match restarts according to the decision that made it dead. A player who commits violent conduct during that stoppage is still sent off, but the restart does not become a free kick for the later act.

When the ball is in play, a physical offence on the field can produce a direct free kick, indirect free kick or penalty kick under Law 12.5. Verbal offences are indirect-free-kick offences. Special boundary-line rules apply to offences committed off the field, so the location of the people and ball must be established before choosing the restart.

The referee does not simply add every possible card

For simultaneous offences, Law 5 directs the referee to punish the more serious one by sanction, restart, physical severity and tactical impact. A reckless foul outside the penalty area that is also DOGSO is therefore punished with the DOGSO red, not a yellow plus a red for the same act.

Distinct cautionable acts are different. If a player enters without permission and then commits a reckless tackle, both cautions can be issued even though they occur close together; the second caution results in a sending-off. Dissent after the referee has stopped play for a reckless foul can similarly produce a second caution without moving the original restart.

Review changes evidence, not the Law 12 test

VAR is available only where the competition is authorised to use it. Under the 2026/27 protocol, potential red-card incidents—including DOGSO, serious foul play, violent conduct and a clearly incorrect second caution—can be reviewed within the protocol's clear-and-obvious-error or serious-missed-incident limits. An ordinary yellow-card judgement is not independently reviewable, although a review of a potential red can end with the referee giving yellow.

The referee makes the final field decision. Any later suspension is determined under the relevant association or competition's disciplinary regulations; that later process does not change the match restart or restore a sent-off player to the match.

Check the appointed competition rules

The standard result of a caution is a yellow card, not an automatic time penalty. IFAB permits approved youth, veterans, disability and grassroots competitions to use temporary dismissals for some or all cautionable offences. The published protocol, including duration and second-caution consequences, controls that competition.

The 2026/27 Law 12 also offers competitions specific sending-off options for provocative, derisory or inflammatory mouth-covering communication with an opponent, and for leaving—or encouraging players to leave—the field in protest at a referee decision. They must not be treated as universal unless the competition has adopted them.

A late tackle stops an attack in midfield

Situation: a defender arrives late, makes reckless contact and stops a promising attack 35 metres from goal. The attack is not an obvious goal-scoring opportunity.

IFAB 2026/27 ruling: direct free kick and yellow card. Recklessness independently requires the caution; SPA provides another cautionable basis, but the same act does not produce two yellows merely because two descriptions apply.

DOGSO inside the penalty area

Situation: an attacker with an obvious opportunity is carelessly tripped when a defender makes a genuine challenge for the ball inside the defender's penalty area.

IFAB 2026/27 ruling: penalty kick and yellow card under the challenge-for-the-ball DOGSO reduction. If the defender instead pulled the attacker's shirt with no attempt or possibility to play the ball, the restart would still be a penalty but the sanction would be red.

Advantage after DOGSO produces a goal

Situation: a goalkeeper carelessly trips an attacker outside the penalty area, denying an obvious opportunity, but the attacker immediately regains the ball and scores.

IFAB 2026/27 ruling: award the goal and give no card for the DOGSO offence. If the same challenge endangered the attacker's safety, the separate serious-foul-play red would still be shown at the next stoppage.

Violent conduct after the ball leaves play

Situation: the ball crosses the touchline for a throw-in; a player then deliberately strikes an opponent in the face with more than negligible force.

IFAB 2026/27 ruling: send the player off for violent conduct and restart with the original throw-in. The strike happened while the ball was out of play, so it does not create a free kick.

Claims the Laws do not support

• “He won the ball, so it cannot be a foul.” The challenge can still be careless, reckless or dangerously forceful.
• “Any contact is a foul.” Football permits fair physical challenges; the Law 12 threshold still has to be met.
• “The last defender must be sent off.” DOGSO uses four stated considerations, now including the location and number of attackers.
• “A penalty means yellow, never red.” The reduction has defined limits; holding, pushing, deliberate handball and serious foul play can remain red.
• “Advantage cancels every card.” It changes SPA and DOGSO discipline, not a separate reckless or sending-off offence.
• “A red card always reduces the eleven on the field.” Sending off a player on the field does; sending off a substitute or team official does not remove an on-field player.

Governing-body sources and effective versions

• The IFAB — Laws of the Game 2026/27, Law 12: Fouls and Misconduct (sections 12.1–12.5)
• The IFAB — Laws of the Game 2026/27, Law 5: The Referee (sections 5.2–5.4)
• The IFAB — Changes to the Laws of the Game 2026/27 (Law 12 changes and competition options)
• The IFAB — 2026/27 implementation notice (effective 1 July 2026)
• The IFAB — Laws of the Game 2026/27, Video Assistant Referee protocol (reviewable incidents and procedure)
• The IFAB — 2026/27 Guidelines for Temporary Dismissals (approved lower-level competition option)

Checked against The IFAB's live 2026/27 Law 12 and Law 5 text, the 2026/27 change presentation and the current VAR and temporary-dismissal protocols. Competition regulations must be checked separately for authorised options, technology, card accumulation and post-match discipline.