Soccer: The offside rule

Salty old All Blacks such as Colin Meads and Laurie Mains give football a grudging respect, but admit they're at sea when the linesman raises his flag to signal offside. Meads and Mains are not alone.

The closest equivalent in rugby is the ever-changing tackled-ball rule, resulting in whistles and stoppages that even the players don't fully understand. Football's offside is less convoluted, but almost designed to incite controversy.

A player is offside if he is ahead of all the opposition players (not including the goalkeeper) when the ball is passed forward to him. Enforcing the offside rule almost requires sideline referees to have a lazy eye - they need simultaneously watch both the ball being passed and the player who is receiving it. Inevitably errors will be made.

Fans of the losing teams should use these errors to claim a moral victory and direct righteous anger towards the linesman.

Hollywoods

Also known as simulations or dives, this universally loathed feat of acting occurs when players pretend to suffer grievous injury to convince the referee to penalise their opposition.

It's also known as "doing a Rivaldo", after the Brazilian's penalty-winning performance clutching his face on the ground after a ball was lobbed into his shin during the 2002 World Cup.

If one of your team is the man on the turf apparently writhing in agony, insist to the ref that a red card or penalty be issued. Otherwise, denounce the player as an effete actor by screaming
"Hollywood!"

Shootouts

When the knock-out stages of the tournament begin and scores are tied after extra time, the winner is determined by a highly athletic version of rock-paper-scissors. Five players from each side kick the ball at the goal from 11 metres out and the side that scores the most wins.

Mark Paston, the All White goalkeeper whose penalty save against Bahrain sent New Zealand to South Africa, summed up the science of the shootout when asked how he knew to dive to his right: "I guessed," he said.

Academic studies show the best goalies in a shootout are those who randomise the direction of their dives. But nations' reputations can be made or broken in this crucible.

Just ask England, whose angst over the shootout comes from, and contributes to, their 73 per cent losing record when matches get to this stage.