As sports evolve, new players, spectators and rules are introduced into the game. The trial of the blue card and double contact in women’s league has been introduced and might be seen in high school in later years.
When a player is shown a blue card by the referee, they are punished by being taken off the field for ten minutes. Soccer player senior Alen Begovic is not in favor of the blue card.
“If the blue card takes a player off the field, it’s like a temporary red card. It then adds a huge advantage for the other team, and most likely, they’ll be exploited and scored on,” Begovic said.
The trial, or testing the performance and qualities, of the blue card is controversial among soccer fans. The blue card would be shown when a foul from a player is not as dangerous as receiving a red card but not as harmless as a yellow.
Soccer player sophomore Hunter Cleary mentioned the pros and cons of implementing the blue card.
“I think the addition of the blue card is a good and bad thing because it penalized players for fouls that could make a goal-scoring situation,” Cleary said. “At the same time, I think that those fouls are, in a way, implemented into the game.”
Women’s volleyball has also recently added a new rule of having double contact. The new double contact rule allows players to touch the ball twice. Previously, players could touch the ball once.
Volleyball player junior Dania Gizaw mentioned how the new rule applies to setters.
“It takes away the effort that setters put in because setters do work really, really hard just for a role to be taken away, and now for their job, anyone can do it,” Gizaw said. “Setting is not supposed to be an easy thing, so I think the rule takes away the beauty of it.”
Although the new double contact rule can take away the individuality of setting, junior Anjali Swaminathan thinks there could be a bright side to the new rule because doubling is called on a lot of setters.
“I think that it would encourage more people to try setting because it would make setting a little bit easier, especially in the younger levels,” Swaminathan said.
Rules in sports can make it safe, organized and also entertaining. Each sport, some athletes believe, has unique rules that adapt over time in order to benefit players and the audience.
“I think rules are implemented into the game to make things fair and consistent and are also what make a sport the sport,” Swaminathan said.