Cleat Cover Spats

[twoclubpapa]

Cleat cover spats are designed to keep the turf debris out of your boots when playing on artificial turf. Good idea! I hate those little asphalt/rubber bits getting into my boots while I'm refereeing a game.

While I don't see any safety issue with wearing spats it was not so long ago that the color of tape applied to player's stockings came into question and the LOTG had to be updated to address this issue. Law 4 states "socks - tape or any material applied or worn externally must be the same colour as that part of the sock it is applied to or covers." These spats come in all sorts of colors and designs so the question arises as to what I should permit as a referee. Since the spat necessarily contacts the sock I expect that the color of the spats must be solid (no design) and must match the part of the sock it contacts, just like tape should.

I've never seen a player use these here in Georgia? Have any of you seen them in SoCal?

I wonder what my State Referee Committee and state high school rules interpreter will say.

 

[whatithink]

What do you do with kids who wear the grip socks under their (cut) uniform socks? From what I see, the majority of them are white, irrespective of the color of the uniform sock and I've never seen anyone penalized for it.

 

[twoclubpapa]

What do you do with kids who wear the grip socks under their (cut) uniform socks? From what I see, the majority of them are white, irrespective of the color of the uniform sock and I've never seen anyone penalized for it.

I haven't had any recreation, club or high school players here in Georgia with cut socks so I wasn't aware of this practice until recently. It came to my attention earlier this year as part of the NFHS 2024-25 high school soccer rules changes. Tape above the ankle must match the sock color with any color allowed at or below the ankle. This seems like a sensible approach and one that I would apply to recreation and club soccer competitions lacking any further instructions from US Soccer.