EAL Field Hockey Umpiring Tips and Best Practices

Tips and Best Practices
Situation	Recommendation

1. Offense is headed toward the circle in possession of the ball.	You should be in front of the play by about 20 yards and always reach the goal line by the cage (subject to player locations and viewing angle) before the ball reaches the cage so that you can visualize whether the ball crossed the goal line or not.
2. Whistle mechanics	Sound the letter "T" into your whistle to make it start abruptly. One "pip" for typical in-game fouls. Give it a pip-pip to bring play back or signal players that they need to attend to something like correct placement of the ball after they just restarted play quickly from the wrong location with a moving ball.
3. Signaling	Always give the primary indicator of the direction of the hit. This includes any ball out of bounds. Even though the players near you know what direction the hit is, the other players on the field and the coaches may not. 25 yard hit (usually after deflection off defense over goal line): Umpire signaling 25 yard hit stands facing the field, makes a sweeping motion with arm, starting by pointing to the corner closest to where the hit will be taken (even with where the ball went over the goal line) and sweeping toward pointing at the spot on the 25 yard line even with where the ball when over the line, for the offense to re-start. Particularly for JV level, you will likely need to verbalize what needs to be done. Penalty corner: Point two arms at cage. Secondary indicator (where you signal the type of foul). Try to do this but if the game is moving very quickly, just indicate direction. After a goal, umpire who has the circle looks to partner to verify that there is no issue. Signal goal with a long whistle with with two arms pointing to center for where the restart will be.
4. High school-specific play	One 90-second time-out per team per game. Teams can call timeout both in same period if they want, but they can't call them consecutively (making a really long time-out). If there is no visible clock, remind the timer to give you (umpire #1) a 1 minute alert, then to follow you up and down the field with the timer and count down the last 10 seconds. If you have a watch which you trust as having accurate time at the moment, you can waive off the timer and say "I've got it". If you have no reason to doubt the time, use their word "Zero" to signal the end of the quarter, and blow your whistle, crossing your arms above your head. If you have been keeping time with your watch and are certain that the timer didn't stop the clock during a time-out, then wave them off before the countdown, and say "I've got the official time", and your whistle will signal the end of the half or quarter. When issuing a card, signal time out and notify the scorekeeper who the card is being given to. If the card is for a coach or during a play in which there was advantage given, try to wait until a stoppage of play to issue.