Eligibility

• All students must compete in a minimum of three league games and be included on the eligibility form to be eligible for playoffs.. 

 

No Change Zone

• By Metro Athletics rule, all gymnasiums and rented external game facilities are "NO CHANGE ZONES." Students of any gender must report to dressing rooms to change their attire if needed.

 

Supervision

• Staff sponsors must be provided for any "out-of-school" coaches and sponsors must be in attendance at all games. Staff sponsors must be employees of the respective school or school district. The staff sponsor must be present during the entire game and present themselves to the opposing team if needed. If there is no staff sponsor present, the game will be considered a default.

 

Play Dates and Times

• Regular season game times vary depending on date and location. Please confirm the start time for each of your games.
• Games will typically run on Tuesday's and Wednesday's.

 

Game Rules

• Duration of game: two halves of 25 minutes each, with a 2 minute half-time. Games should start at the listed start time as each booking is only one hour.
  • If a team does not arrive within 10 minutes of the scheduled game time, the game will be considered a default.
  • If there is no referee, teams can either postpone to a mutual date or play the game with an alternate referee approved by both coaches. If the game is played with an alternate ref, the result of the game will stand.
• Player Maximum: 20 players at most can be dressed by each team.
• Bench Capacity: Teams can have up to 20 dressed athletes on the bench and 4 coaches/managers for a total of 24 people on the bench. Any additional undressed players or staff beyond the 24 max must sit on the bleacher side. 
• Mixed Rules: two female position players must be on the field at all time (goalie does not count toward this minimum). (Female rule clarification for high school: 2 females on the field at all time when at full strength. A team may play short a female if they only have 1. But that means they play a player down. They could also play down 2 players and play with no females but if a time penalty is given they would forfeit. If a female gets a penalty she serves her penalty but is considered “on the field” for the duration of her penalty. The team does not need to have two additional females on the playing surface. One female in the box and one on the field and the team is short a player. A female player can not serve a male players penalty or vice versa. All bench penalties and Goal Keeper penalties will be served by a male player. If co-incidental penalties are given–play will continue as if at full strength. Any students who do not identify as male or female are permitted to play and are considered 'X' Gender, and follow the same playing rules as a Male player on the field. 
• Ties in Regular Season games: regular season games which are tied after regulation end as a tie.
• Ties in Playoff Games: In playoffs, a tie game immediately proceeds to a shootout. All team players including the goalie can participate as shooters, the first 5 shooters must include two females minimum. If still tied after 5 shooters, the 6th shooter must be a female, 7th shooter a male or X gender, 8th a female, and follow that gender order until the tie is broken.
  • Equalization - For Playoff shootouts we will use equalization to make the shootout fair as we have teams with varying roster sizes.  This means each team must identify in total 4 females, and 10 males / X gender shooters  *** (see below) who will participate in the shootout as needed.. Once teams have utilized their 5 initial shooters (minimum 2 females) and are going into extra shooters, you can pick from your remaining players left of your 4 & 10 choices. (This would be from the remaining 2 females and 7 males or X).  Once a team has used their 4 females and the shootout is still undecided, they will go back to their original female shooter in the same order established in the beginning aka they may Recycle a shooter. For boys or X gender players once they've used their 10th male or X, they then go back to their original male or x shooter aka recycle shooters.  This will help us avoid a situation where a team with only a few females (or males) gets an advantage by using a top ranked shooter while another team continues on in the sequence.
     ​*** if a team does not have 4 & 10 of each gender at the game due to a small roster, they will use all players in the proper gender sequence (initial 5, then female, male/x, female etc) and will go back to the top of their order once all players of that gender have gone.  Their opponents have the option to stick with the 4 & 10, or to match the same combo of male/x & female shooters their opponents have available***
• Playoffs: Athletes must participate in a minimum of 3 regular season games to participate in playoffs. 
• Uniforms: For Indoor Soccer teams should be contrasting at first glance, this is a benefit to teammates and a requirement for officials.  If teams do not have contrasting uniforms, it will be the responsibility of the visiting team in regular season or lower seed come playoffs to either bring pinnies, or find an alternate kit for the game. 

 

Yellow-Card Tracking

• First 3 Yellow Cards - 1 game suspension
• 2 additional - 1 game suspension
• 1 additional - 2 game suspension
• 1 additional - 4 game suspension & hearing

Note that an automatic suspension within a game due to a red card or two yellow cards advance a player to the next step in this system.

 

Score Reporting and Standings

• Winning team is responsible for reporting scores. Scores are reported using the Goalline system by logging onto the Admin Login at the top right-hand corner of metroathletics.ca. Each school's Athletic Director has or will have your school's login. Schools are required to keep record of their rosters and game sheets for all league games until the season has completed. 
• Winning team must also email the gamesheet for both teams to shawn@metroathletics.ca
• Standings: 3 points for a win, 1 point for a draw
• +5 rule: A maximum of +5 goal differential will be counted from any game. The Goalline system will automatically accept a game score and then remove any goals for the winning team past +5 from the losing team's goal amount. Coaches are expected to honour the +5 rule in the way they manage their substitutions in games which reach and exceed the 5 goal threshold.
• Standings tie-breaking: ties will be broken as follows (note scores edited as per the +5 differential rule will be the scores used for tiebreaking purposes):
  • Total points earned by wins/ties/losses
  • Head-to-head points earned
  • Goals for minus against amongst tied teams
  • Goals for amongst tied teams
  • Goals for minus against amongst all teams
  • Goals for amongst all teams