Why Hearts Were Shown a Red Card – Explained by Football’s Lawmakers
Hearts were reduced to ten men during their Scottish Cup semi-final clash with Aberdeen, but what do the official rules say about the red card incident?
The match was locked at 1-1 after Pape Gueye opened the scoring for the Dons and Lawrence Shankland responded for the Jambos. But late in the first half, Hearts’ January signing Michael Steinwender was shown a straight red card for a challenge on Topi Keskinen, sparking boos from the Hearts support.
Although Steinwender had teammates trying to cover, he went to ground and referee John Beaton didn’t hesitate to brandish the red. Fans were outraged, but what do the IFAB laws of the game say?
IFAB’s Explanation for the Red Card
The decision doesn’t fall under serious foul play, which involves a dangerous or excessively forceful challenge, nor is it violent conduct, which applies to using excessive force without playing the ball.
Instead, the red card was issued for denying an obvious goal-scoring opportunity. According to IFAB, this occurs when a player commits an offence—punishable by a free kick—that prevents an opponent from having a clear chance to score while moving toward the goal.
The laws state that if such an offence happens inside the penalty area and the player is genuinely attempting to play the ball, only a yellow card is shown. However, if the offence involves actions like holding, pulling, pushing, or making no attempt to play the ball, then a red card must be given.
In this case, since Steinwender’s challenge wasn’t considered an attempt to fairly play the ball, the red card was enforced under the denial of a goal-scoring opportunity rule.
