British American Football Association Football Rules and Interpretations 2012-13 Edition (With 2013 Changes)
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BRITISH AMERICAN FOOTBALL ASSOCIATION FOOTBALL RULES AND INTERPRETATIONS 2012-13 EDITION (WITH 2013 CHANGES) ©BAFA2013 Foreword The rules are revised each year to improve the sport’slev elofsafety and quality of play,and to clarify the meaning and intent of rules where necessary.The principles that govern all rule changes are that theymust: •besafe for the participants; •beapplicable at all levels of the sport; •becoachable; •beadministrable by the officials; •maintain a balance between offense and defence; •beinteresting to spectators; •not have a prohibitive economic impact; and •not be unduly divergent from the rules adopted by EFAF in Europe and NCAA in the USA. These rules apply to all contests involving BAFA-affiliated teams and takeeffect from 1st March 2013 (Exception: Competitions that beganbefore 1st March 2013 will continue to use 2012 rules until the end of their competition). Forbrevity,male pronouns are used extensively in this book, but the rules are equally applicable to female and male participants. BAFA has established a mechanism for discussing and deciding future changes to this book. Each organisation affiliated to BAFAhas a voice on the Rules Committee. Youmay makesuggestions for changes to your organisation’srepresentative(s). Suggestions may be made at anytime, but to eligible for consideration for the following year theymust be receivedby1st October. Jim Briggs, BAFRA (Editor) on behalf of the BAFA Rules Committee Those who find it necessary to write to the editor for interpretations of rules or play situations will receive prompt replies if theynumber their questions and email them to [email protected]. The editor would liketothank the following people who assisted in the production of this edition of the rulebook (GB except where stated): JeffBatzler (Sweden) Amir Brooks Phil Clarke Ian Davies Ben Griffiths David Knight Tzvi Lindeman AndrewLovell James Meredith CK Nam Russell Newton Peter Parsons Michal Rosival(Czech Republic) Norval Scott Pete Thom Frank Thomson Kris Walentynowicz (Poland) Lee Wood 2 TableofContents Rules changes...........................................................................................................................................................4 Points of emphasis ...................................................................................................................................................8 The Football Code..................................................................................................................................................11 BAFA Disciplinary Code .......................................................................................................................................14 Rules and Interpretations .......................................................................................................................................27 Rule 1 — The Game, Field, Players and Equipment.........................................................................................29 Rule 2 — Definitions .........................................................................................................................................45 Rule 3 — Periods, Time Factors and Substitutions ...........................................................................................61 Rule 4 — Ball in Play,Dead Ball, Out of Bounds.............................................................................................76 Rule 5 — Series of Downs, Line to Gain ..........................................................................................................80 Rule 6 — Kicks..................................................................................................................................................84 Rule 7 — Snapping and Passing the Ball ..........................................................................................................96 Rule 8 — Scoring.............................................................................................................................................111 Rule 9 — Conduct of Players and Others Subject to the Rules.......................................................................120 Rule 10 — Penalty Enforcement .....................................................................................................................136 Rule 11 — The Officials: Jurisdiction and Duties...........................................................................................144 Rule 12 — Instant replay .................................................................................................................................145 Rule 13 — Standards for Game Management .................................................................................................154 Rule 14 — Football variants ............................................................................................................................166 Summary of penalties ..........................................................................................................................................167 Officials’ Signals..................................................................................................................................................178 Appendix A — Guidelines for Game Officials to Use During a Serious On-Field Player Injury.......................180 Appendix B — Guidelines for Game Officials and Game Management ToUse Regarding Lightning..............181 Appendix C — Concussions................................................................................................................................184 Appendix D — Field Diagrams ...........................................................................................................................186 Appendix E — Equipment: Additional Details ...................................................................................................192 BAFRA Terms and Conditions............................................................................................................................194 IndexofRules and Interpretations.......................................................................................................................201 3 Rules chang es Major chang es The list belowshows rule number,description of the change, and page number in this book. It includes changes introduced in 2011 and 2012. 1-2-1 Cannot play without 5-yard lines and hash marks 30 1-2-3-b No person outside the team area shall be inside the limit lines 31 1-2-4-b Maximum 25 non-players in team area 32 1-4-6-b-1 No restriction on colour of gloves 39 1-4-6-e Restrictions on eye shade 40 1-4-11-a TV monitors permitted in coaches’sbooths 41 1-4-11-g Jurisdiction overcommunications equipment 42 2-12-9 Newdefinition of north-south line 51 2-27-12 Disqualified player must leave playing enclosure (see also 9-2-6-b) 58 2-27-14 Newdefinition of defenseless player 58 3-3-2-e-10 Clock does not stop if ball carrier’shelmet comes off 67 3-3-5-a Injury timeout changes 69 3-4-2-b-8 Additional reason for delay of game 71 3-4-4 10-second subtraction 72 3-5-3 More than 11 players 74 6-1-10 Illegalwedge 86 6-3-14 Restrictions for defensive linemen on place kicks 91 7-1-2-b-5 Offensive team nevercoming to a stop is a false start 96 7-1-4-a-4 Legalfor offensive linemen to lock legs (deleted former 7-1-3-b-2) 98 7-3-2 Reasonable opportunity to catch not required in legally grounding a 102 pass 9-1-6 Blocking belowthe waist 121 9-1-7-c Illegaltogoout of bounds to block an out-of-bounds player 122 9-1-16-a-5 No foul for running into/roughing the kicker if caused by opponent’s 125 block 9-2 All Team B unsportsmanlikeconduct carries automatic first down 126 9-2-1 Unsportsmanlikeconduct fouls: live-ball or dead-ball 126 9-2-3 Penalty Revised penalty options for unfair acts 129 9-2-6-b Disqualified player must leave playing enclosure (see also 2-27-12) 129 9-4-1 10 yard penalty for illegalbatting or kicking 133 12-3-5-c End of half clock adjustment possible with instant replay 149 13-2-3-e Use positive knowledge to stop stadium clock 155 13-7-5-a No two-minute warning before 2’00 163 4 table continued... Rules changes 5 13-8-3 Age groups standardised on school year 164 13-8-3-a U-19 restored to December cutoff 164 13-8-3-b U-17 restored to December cutoff 164 14-1 No longer anydifferences between senior and junior football 166 NewApproved Rulings A.R. 1-4-8:II A.R. 6-3-14:I A.R. 8-2-1:VII A.R. 9-2-1:II A.R. 9-2-1:VII A.R. 3-4-4:I A.R. 6-3-14:II A.R. 8-2-1:VIII A.R. 9-2-1:III A.R. 9-2-1:VIII A.R. 3-4-4:II A.R. 7-1-2:IV A.R. 8-2-1:IX A.R. 9-2-1:IV A.R. 9-3-3:I A.R. 3-4-4:III A.R. 8-2-1:V A.R. 9-1-6:VII A.R. 9-2-1:V A.R. 9-4-1:XI A.R. 6-3-4:IV A.R. 8-2-1:VI A.R. 9-1-10:V A.R. 9-2-1:VI A.R. 10-1-6:II Editorial chang es The following list shows those rules that have been subject to editorial change, i.e. deletions, corrected errors, clarifications due to interpretation and items rewritten for readability.The list also includes those ApprovedRulings altered to conform with rule changes. In this edition of the rulebook, a significant number of approvedrulings that have become somewhat dated or are unnecessary have been removed. Furthermore, the reorganisation of Rules 7 and 9 required different labelling and numbering of several existing approvedrulings. These are not marked in the text nor listed here. 1-1-3-a 1-1-3-b 1-1-4 1-1-5 1-1-6-a 1-1-6-b 1-1-6-c 1-1-7-b 1-2-1-a-1 1-2-1-c 1-2-1-e 1-2-1-g 1-2-1-l 1-2-4-c 1-2-4-d