Shoe Laces Untied

[cgarrigues]

Came to me while watching the scrimmages at Oosterbaan today. Retaining posession after a shot, offensive player bringing the ball in stops to rety his shoe. Is this allowed any time before the ball is whistled back into play? Are there other conditions when a player delay the restart of play without a timeout?

[LaxRef]

f. Delaying the game—When for a team delay, the penalty shall be assigned to the in-home. Delaying the game shall be the consuming of more than 20 seconds:
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(6) For adjusting of equipment, 20 seconds to begin when the adjusting of equipment begins.

I always thought this was a bit vague. Can they get 20 seconds any time they want it? I wouldn't allow it, but the rules don't really say.

I will say that if the same guy needed to tie his shoes twice in the same game, I'd make it very clear that he'd better use a double knot, because the next time he tried it I'd be calling delay of game and it would be a turnover or 30 seconds. Similarly, if a team seemed to be using it as a tactic, I'd call a foul as well.

BTW, you can not get a horn if play is suspended for equipment issues; the rules used to say you couldn't have special substitution in this situation, but they've removed that clause (which is good, because I never thought it made any sense).

[Lax_Stats]

I would allow the player to tie his shoe unless he is taking an inordinate amount of time or using this as an obvious stall tactic. It's pretty hard to have your shoe come intentionally untied just when you want it to, so I would give the player the benefit of the doubt. For me, this would be a safety issue. However, if this was a repetitive issue with the same player, I would agree with LaxRef in telling him to double tie his shoes or sub off and let a player with tied shoes take his place in the game.