Blue card set to be introduced in football and FA Cup could adopt it this year

A blue card is set to be trialled in football matches, with players brandished with one forced into a sin bin for 10 minutes.

The Telegraph reports the move will be announced by IFAB on Friday, and that blue cards will be shown to players for cynical fouls or dissent.

Players will also be sent off if they receive two blue cards in the same match, as they will if they receive a combination of a blue card and a yellow card in the same match.

Card could be trialled in FA Cup matches

The FA is reportedly considering volunteering matches in the the men’s and women’s FA Cups for blue-card trials starting from the 2024-25 season.

Legendary former ref and current FIFA refs’ chief Pierluigi Collina supports the sin-bin concept: “The idea is to start working on this as soon as possible to provide those who would be involved in the trial a protocol to be used. The idea is to get it soon.

“The trial was very successful in grassroots competitions. Now we are talking of a higher level, very probably professional or even high professional football.”

FA chief executive Mark Bullingham confirmed his interest in introducing sin-bins to the professional game last year following successful grassroots trials.

“When we were looking at sin bins – protocol clearly has to be developed – the areas we were looking at were dissent, where it’s worked very, very well in the grassroots game in England,” he said.