IT’S well known our Premier League is watched around the world.

When refereeing a friendly for Reading FC Academy against a touring American club, one of their adult supporters told me he watched Premier League matches every week in Mid-west America.

No surprise then, when last week I read comments from Holland about the incident in the Liverpool vs Tottenham game, which I covered in my last column.

The report I read from the Netherlands looked at it in a rather different way.

Regular readers will recall a ball was passed to Tottenham’s centre forward Harry Kane, when he was in an offside position.

However, a Liverpool player, trying to intercept the pass, only succeeded in knocking it on to Kane.

This meant Kane was played onside, but the Dutch commentator focused on the part of the Law covering gaining an advantage from being in an offside position, which is often misunderstood.

Gaining an advantage in an offside position is described in the law as ‘playing the ball or interfering with an opponent when the ball has rebounded or deflected off the goalpost, crossbar, match official or an opponent, or has been deliberately saved by an opponent.’ So what constitutes a ‘save’?

The Liverpool player who played the ball was obviously not making a save. He was merely trying to stop the ball getting through to Kane.

In fact, the Law spells out what it considers a save to be.

A ‘save’, it says, ‘is when a player stops or attempts to stop a ball, which is going into, or is very close to the goal, with any part of his body except the hands/arms (unless the goalkeeper in his own penalty area).

When the goalkeeper makes a save that rebounds to an offside player, the answer is clearly offside.

However, an outfield defender who kicks the ball from the goalmouth area that only goes to an offside opponent, means a decision needed from the referee.

Was he making a save or just attempting to clear the ball?