What is an own goal in football?

The most common scenarios grow out of defending's hardest moments: a defender stretching to clear a driven cross and steering it into their own net, a sliding block that turns the ball goalward, a back-pass rolling past a wrong-footed goalkeeper after a mix-up. A shot deflecting off a defender on its way in is another frequent form.

The core of the rule is simple: if the ball wholly crosses the goal line and no offence stopped play in the build-up, the goal stands regardless of whose touch sent it in. Whether the goal happened is certain; who it is attributed to is a separate question that belongs to the record keepers rather than the referee.

A ball that goes directly into a player's own goal from a restart is not a goal. If the taker of a throw-in, a free kick or a goal kick sends the ball into their own net without it touching anyone, play restarts with a corner kick for the opposing team. The exception exists so that restarts cannot turn directly into self-inflicted punishment.

Any touch on the way, including by a teammate, removes the exception and the normal rules apply. And if the attacking team committed an offence in the move, a foul on the defender or the ball striking an attacker's arm, the goal would not stand in the first place.

On the scoreboard the goal belongs to the opposing team; in the records it lives in a category of its own. An own goal is never added to a player's scoring tally and appears in no scoring charts; match records mark it next to the player's name with an own goal annotation.

The genuine debates live at the boundary: when a shot heading in deflects off a defender, someone must decide whether it remains the shooter's goal or becomes an own goal. The common approach is that a ball already going in keeps its original scorer, while a decisive touch that diverts a ball not otherwise on target counts as an own goal. The exact criteria differ between competitions and the bodies that keep the records.