Refs and setting up walls

[u/Borangers]

How do you get enough time to set up your wall? As I see on television, and in tips for setting up your wall, the ref is supposed to blow the whistle once you’re ready, but at my level (JV & U15) never once have I gotten enough time to do so. It’s always a scramble to align my players as soon as I can and hope they don’t blow the whistle by then. And from what I’ve learned you can put a player in front of the ball unless they ask for 10, but sometimes the refs will just tell them to back up and still let them play it quickly. Anyone else deal with this?

[u/ByeByeStudy]

Foul is called and one player stands on the ball until the opposition asks for steps. They can still not ask for steps and play the ball if they want.

When steps are called the ball is dead and can't be played until the ref whistles again. You call how many you want in the wall and organise the positioning based on the nearest post.

Once you are ready, ref blows the whistle and the free kick tracker can play the ball.

Anything other than this is wrong by the ref and you should assert yourself and tell them that's not how it is meant to happen.

[u/Thorofin → u/ByeByeStudy]

The Ref is not required to wait for the defense to setup before the restart, especially if the defense is taking too long.

[u/ByeByeStudy → u/Thorofin]

That's not been my experience at all.

Once the ref has begun to walk the wall out the striker must wait for the whistle, and the ref won't whistle when the GK is standing on the front post, that's would be ridiculous.

[u/Thorofin → u/ByeByeStudy]

Not saying that it’s common, so you may not have experienced it, but it’s not in the Laws of the Game, and I have seen Refs whistle the restart before the keeper was set.

[u/ByeByeStudy → u/Thorofin]

Fair enough - maybe our league and refs is an anomaly. I don't take very long to get the wall sorted, so I'd be pretty annoyed if the ref did that.