Back to basics

After seeing Louis Saha's goal against Arsenal last night,I began wondering how complicated the beautiful game had become. The rules which are to simplify the game are rather causing so many gray areas,the fun and excitement is giving way to controversy and conflict.
I remember when the offside law used to be so simple to grasp. If you were closer to your opponent's goal than the ball and the last defender, you were flagged offside. Juxtapose that to the modern versions of the law and there's a huge gap in difference.
''A player in an offside position is only penalised if, at the moment the ball
touches or is played by one of his team, he is, in the opinion of the referee,
involved in active play by:
• interfering with play or
• interfering with an opponent or
• gaining an advantage by being in that position''
So from a simple issue of postion on the pitch, the law now talks about what you do and don't do even in a seemingly offside position. Tough work for the brain,isn't it?
Sadly,it's the defending team that suffers from FIFA's constant tinkering of the law and one can only wonder what their motivation is.
Lauren Koscielny's attempted clearance gave Saha the right to score even when youngest of football fans could see he was offside.Tough but that's what modernity has done to football. The smart ones will now all the right to find the loopholes and build castles in them.
Another example of a similar goal happened in the 2006 World Cup in a game involving South Korea and Switzerland when Frei scored following a deflection off a Korean defender even when Frei was virtually living in an offside position.
If that is far fetched, Tom Huddlestone scored for Spurs at Fulham this current season in England but the key moment was when Gallas blocked the sight of Schwarzer and even flicked a leg at the ball on its way into the goal. The surprising part of the story is that the officials allowed the goal. Yes, they did when they rules work with tell them and all of us that when players do what Gallas did, they are ''interfering with play or interfering with an opponent'' and they should flagged offside. One can only sigh at all these complications and wonder where all these things came from to live with us.
However,for all those players who have escaped the flag and scored or helped in a goal for their teams,I can only see how smart they were and their prudence further highlights how tough the rules have made it for officials, players,journalists,pundits,commentators and everybody who's linked with the game. Ask Andy Gray and Richard Keys.
Finally,let's pray for Mr. Sepp Blatter since it's his ideas like the modern offside law that are leading this game into an era where all understanding will taken away from all of us and we'll have to keep the law by our sofas and in our bags just to keep up with the evolutions of football.