Faculty of Sport, University of Ljubljana, ISSN 1318-2269  43
Li-Hong (Leo) Hsu REVISITING FAIR PLAY: CHEATING, 
THE »GOOD FOUL« AND SPORTS RULES
ŠE EN POGLED NA FAIRPLAY: GOLJUFANJE, 
»DOBER PREKRŠEK« IN ŠPORTNA PRAVILA
Abstract
Cheating and the "good foul" are important issues in 
sport ethics. Over the past several years, the issue on 
cheating in sport has received scant philosophical at-
tention. While many authors are against the practice of 
cheating, some still argue that cheating is inseparable 
from sporting activities. The moral intuition in relation 
to "rule formalism" is often that cheating is wrong 
because to cheat is to break the rules and to cheat is no 
longer to play the game. In a previous work I argued that 
this intuition is right on one account and wrong on the 
other. Although cheating is morally wrong, it cannot be 
defined merely as "breaking the written rules". In other 
words, breaking rules is often related to cheating but 
not necessarily. In addition, cheating often is associated 
w it h t he "go o d fou l ". I f c he at i ng i s mor a l ly u nac c e pt a ble , 
then what about the "good foul"? In order to have a better 
understanding on the relationship between cheating, the 
good foul and sports rules, a few questions still need to 
be clarified: Is the "good foul" related to the rules? Is the 
good foul the same as cheating? Is the good foul morally 
acceptable? This paper aims to answer those questions.
Key words: fair play, cheating, the good foul, sports 
rules
Department of Sports Business Management, 
Da-Yeh University, Taiwan
Corresponding author: 
Department of Sports Business Management, Da-Y eh University
112 Shan-Jiau Rd. Da-Tsuen, 
Changhua, Taiwan 515, Taiwan
Tel.: +886 4 8511888 # 3497
Fax: +886 4 8511666
E-mail: hsuleo@hotmail.com
Izvleček
Goljufanje in "dober prekršek" sta pomembni vprašanji 
športne etike. V preteklih letih je bilo le malo filozofskih 
razprav namenjenih goljufanja v športu. Mnogi avtorji 
goljufanju nasprotujejo, vendar pa nekateri trdijo, da je 
goljufanje neločljivo povezano s športnimi aktivnostmi. 
Z vidika moralne intuicije, ki se navezuje na "formalizem 
pravil", je goljufanje prekršek, saj dejansko pomeni kr-
šenje pravil in izničenje pravega pomena igre. V prejšnji 
študiji sem trdil, da je ta intuicija po eni strani pravilna, 
po drugi pa ne. Čeprav je goljufanje moralno sporno, pa 
ga ne moremo opredeliti zgolj kot "kršenje napisanih 
pravil". Z drugimi besedami, kršenje pravil je pogosto 
vendar ne nujno povezano z goljufanjem. Poleg tega je 
goljufanje pogosto povezano z "dobrim prekrškom". Če 
je goljufanje moralno nesprejemljivo, kako je potem z 
"dobrim prekrškom"? Da bi bolje razumeli odnos med 
goljufanjem, dobrim prekrškom in športnimi pravili, 
moramo razjasniti še nekaj vprašanj: Je dober prekršek 
povezan s pravili? Je dober prekršek enakovreden golju-
fanju? Je dober prekršek moralno sprejemljiv? Namen 
tega prispevka je odgovoriti na ta vprašanja.
Ključne besede: fairplay, goljufanje, dober prekršek, 
športna pravila
 Kinesiologia Slovenica, 11, 1, 43–49 (2005)
This paper was presented at the 2004 Pre-Olympic Congress 6-11 August, Thessaloniki, Greece, 2004.

44 Revisiting fair play Kinesiologia Slovenica, 11, 1, 43–49 (2005) 
I. Introduction
Cheating and the "good foul" are important issues in sport ethics. Over the past several years, 
the issue on cheating in sport has received scant philosophical attention. As Roberts (1996) 
observes that although there have been several books in sport philosophy published in the past 
5 years (e.g., Hyland, 1990; Kretchmar, 1994; Morgan, 1994; Simon, 1991; Wertz, 1991), in the 
main, scant attention has been paid to cheating. While many authors are against the practice 
of cheating (e.g., Arnold, 1997; Delattre, 1988; Feezell, 1988; Johnston, 1991; Rosenberg, 1995; 
Suits, 1973), some (e.g., Leaman, 1988; Lehman, 1988) still argue that cheating is inseparable 
from sporting activities. Leaman (1988, pp. 280) mentions that cheating is acceptable because 
"the fact that people may cheat is part of the structure of sport and is taken into consideration in 
the rules of sport, so that cheating in a sport can be built into audience and player perceptions 
of the game". Lehman (1988, pp. 287) also suspects that "no argument that makes deliberate 
violation of rules a sufficient condition for unsportsmanlike conduct is likely to apply to many 
of t he spor t s we k now".The mora l i nt u it ion i n relat ion to "r u le for ma l ism" is often t hat cheat i ng 
is wrong because to cheat is to break the rules and to cheat is no longer to play the game. If we 
refer to Morgan's (1995, pp. 50) clear statement: " According to formalism, the various derivative 
notions of a game are to be defined exclusively in terms of its formal rules. What it means to 
engage in a game, to count as legitimate instance of a game, to qualify as a bona fide action of 
a game, and to win a game is to act in accordance with the appropriate rules of that game. All 
instances and actions that fall outside the rules of the game, therefore, do not count as legitimate 
instances or actions of a game".
In a previous work I argued that this intuition is right on one account and wrong on the other 
(Hsu, 1999). A lt hough cheating is mora l ly w rong, it cannot be defined merely as " brea k ing t he 
written rules". In other words, breaking rules is often related to cheating but not necessarily. In 
addition, cheating often is associated with the "good foul ". If cheating is morally unacceptable, 
then what about the "good foul"? 
In order to have a better understanding on the relationship between cheating, the good foul 
and sports rules, a few questions still need to be clarified: Is the "good foul" related to the rules? 
Is the good foul the same as cheating? Is the good foul morally acceptable? This paper aims to 
answer those questions.
II. The concept of the "good foul"
Firstly, a foul normally takes place when one commits an act that is not in compliance with the 
rules and, therefore, a prescribed penalty is meted out in punishment for that act. Fraleigh (1988) 
gives a more detailed account of fouls. According to him, (written) rules have three functions: 
(a)  They have a positive prescription. Everyone in the game "must" have and is "allowed" to 
perform certain skills and use certain tactics under the rules. 
(b)  They ser ve to ident i f y t he w it hi n-t he-contest goa l. The players k now what to do i n order to 
achieve the goal (e.g. winning). 
(c)  They serve also to proscribe certain illegal actions. 

Revisiting fair play 45 Kinesiologia Slovenica, 11, 1, 43–49 (2005) 
In other words, the rules of the game must include the spirit of fair play. One who competes in 
a game agrees to follow the rules of the game and each participant can fairly test his/her skills 
and tactics. If anyone does not obey the rules of a game, then that person's action is generally 
deemed a foul or an infringement. Secondly, a foul can generally fall into three categories: 
(a) unintentional or inadvertent violation of rules,
(b) intentional but attempting to avoid a penalty, and 
(c) intentional but willing to accept the penalty.  
It has to be emphasized that this is just the simplest way to distinguish between the three types 
of foul. In fact, different sports have their own unique distinctions.
In the first instance, a player unintentionally violates the rules or is "set up" by an opponent, i.e. 
by accident or by not knowing the rules of a game. Given the example from Fraleigh, a basketball 
defensive player, attempting to attain or maintain a good defensive position against an opponent 
who feints and then dribbles toward the basket to score, trips the attacker unintentionally. If 
this player really has "unintentionally" violated the rules (which is much more closely related 
to persona l motivation and cannot a lways be easi ly judged by t he referee), we can only say t hat 
s/he should not be accused of being morally bad. Whether or not s/he is penalized will depend 
on the rules of the game in question. Some sports rules do consider athletes' "intentions" in this 
matter; some do not. 
In the second instance, a player who intentionally violates a rule to gain an advantage but skilfully 
attempts to do so while avoiding a penalty is an unsportsmanlike person. This may happen 
when, for example, a soccer player commits an off-the-ball foul without being detected. S/he 
cheats because s/he has broken the rules intentionally by deception and tried to gain an unfair 
advantage. But as the referees do not see the "real illegal action" on many occasions, they cannot 
give any penalty for it. This is unethical behaviour in sport and it is to be regarded more seriously 
in sports because the player destroys the playing spirit of a game, and treats the game merely as 
an instrument to win or gain an unfair advantage.
In the third instance, a player violates the rules whilst expecting and willingly accepting a penalty. 
According to Fraleigh, this is called "good foul" (or professional foul or strategic foul). It seems 
that there are "good" fouls in different kinds of sports, but what do we really mean by "good"? 
Consider the following two interpretations of a good foul, from basketball and soccer. 
A “good” foul in basketball occurs where a defensive player, moving behind an offensive player 
with the ball who is dribbling for an easy lay up shot, intentionally holds the player, forcing him 
to shoot t wo f ree t hrows to ma ke t he sa me number of points. Such acts are ca l led good because 
it is in the prudent self-interest of the fouling player to force the opponent to shoot twice from a 
g reater d ist a nce to ma ke t he s a me nu mber of poi nt s a s wou ld have been made by shoot i ng once 
for a lay up. Violating the rules intelligently occurs, if we consider only the self-interest of the 
offending player and team (Fraleigh, 1988).
In soccer, when a player running for goal is fouled with the intention to stop him from scoring, 
the offending player obviously knows the rules but intends to violate them because of his/her 
own self-interest. This, no doubt, is in breach of the agreement (consent) of all participants and 
is against the purpose of the sport. 

46 Revisiting fair play Kinesiologia Slovenica, 11, 1, 43–49 (2005) 
F o l l o w i n g t h e e x a m p l e s a b o v e , w e c a n c o n c l u d e t h a t g o o d f o u l s , s u c h a s i n t e n t i o n a l h o l d i n g , t r i p -
ping, and so on, are not part of the game or within the rules of the sport. They are only related to 
one's own benefit and do not respect the rules of the game. Thus, a good foul is normally described 
as when a sports player commits a foul (breaking explicit rules of the game) deliberately so as to 
expect and be willing to accept the penalty in order to win the game or gain unfair advantage. 
Technically, such an athlete may be said to be a bad player, and further consider his/her action 
morally wrong. Consequently, a good foul as discussed above, meets criteria of an unethical 
act in sport, which a participant:
1. deliberately interferes with the rules of the game without an ethical reason;
2. does not present an equal opportunity for mutual contesting of relative abilities;
3. is not agreed and accepted by all relevant agents in the game.
III. Cheating and the "good foul"
However, the question remains: Is the "good foul" a kind of cheating? I want to contend that it is 
not. It is evident that not all misconduct in sport is cheating, thus violence, sexual harassment and 
child abuse in sport are not examples of cheating but they are examples of unethical behaviour 
in sport. 
As previously argued, cheating is not necessarily related to "breaking the rules" of the game. 
Rather it has to do with an athlete's intention to deceive in order to gain an unfair advantage. 
Since we can tell that the concept of the good foul does not entail one's intention to deceive, it 
c a n b e a s s u m e d t h a t t h e g o o d f o u l i s i m p o r t a n t l y d i ff e r e n t f r o m c h e a t i n g . L e a m a n (1 9 8 8 , p p . 2 7 8 ) 
addresses this point clearly: "A player may commit a professional or tactical foul in front of the 
referee or umpire because he considers that it is better to break the rules and suffer the penalty 
rat her t ha n not to com m it t he fou l at a l l. Of cou rse, such a player wou ld prefer t he offence to be 
unobserved, but cannot reasonably expect it in those circumstances to be overlooked. It is not 
obvious whether this sort of case is an example of cheating or not. If the intention to deceive 
is a necessary condition of cheating, then obviously such a case is not one of cheating, for not 
only did the player not tend to deceive, but he could not even reasonably have expected such an 
intention to be realized. Yet the rules of the game have been broken, and it might well be argued 
that it is the intention to break the rules rather than the intention to deceive which will do as a 
necessary condition of cheating." 
Si mon (19 91) a l s o a rg ue s t hat "st r ateg ic fou l i ng" shou ld not be s e en a s che at i ng a nd he add re s s e s 
this by relating to penalties. He writes (Simon, 1991, pp.48): "Once we distinguish between two 
kinds of penalties, sanctions for prohibited acts and prices for options, we can see that it is far 
from clear that strategic fouling is cheating. This is because the penalties for the fouls can be 
regarded as prices for exercise of a strategy rather than the sanctions for a prohibited violation 
of the rules. Indeed, this does seem to be the common understanding of intentional fouling to 
stop the clock in basketball".
Simon uses the example of "intentional fouling to stop the clock in basketball" as a price for the 
exercise of a strategy rather than the sanction for a prohibited violation of the rules. He seems to 
accept this behaviour as long as the penalty is fair. Yet, Simon somehow overlooks the purpose 

Revisiting fair play 47 Kinesiologia Slovenica, 11, 1, 43–49 (2005) 
of sport in his example. If we agree that the purpose of a penalty is to keep the game fair and 
keep the game moving smoothly, then in this case we can dispute whether there is real fairness. 
According to Simon (1991, pp. 208): " A penalty is a fair price for the violation of a rule, if skilled 
competitors would be indifferent between two situations: first, in which the rule was violated and 
the penalty imposed, and second, in which the rule was not violated". Two questions, therefore, 
can be asked. 
Firstly, in the case of athletes' intention and action: 
Intentional fouling to stop the clock in basketball is the same as "breaking rules with intention 
(deliberately)" in order to gain a personal or team advantage. Are both intention and action 
acceptable? 
Secondly, a penalty might become advantage: 
Intentional fouling to stop the clock in basketball which calls for the "penalty" (two foul shots) 
might bring more "advantage" for the fouling side since they might take advantage from an 
opponent 's wea k nes s i n shoot i ng fou l s . It cou ld produce t he cou nter- effec t . Is t h i s rea l ly fa i r for 
the non-fouling side?
In answer to the first question, both intention and action are unacceptable because they not only 
deliberately against the written rules of basketball but also the purpose of sport in general and 
it should not be accepted independently of the penalty. 
Concerning the second question, although "intentional fouling to stop the clock in basketball" 
calls for penalties, one might find certain difficulties in assuring real fairness in this case, since 
there would be a counter-effect of securing an advantage for the offending party. The problem 
might be related to the "deficiency of the rules of basketball" and sometimes it is possible to 
see the weak side of a team or an athlete acting in the manner described above in order to win 
the game or gain an advantage. According to my knowledge, international basketball rules do 
not deal with this matter. They only proscribe technical infringements which are deliberate, or 
unsportsmanlike, or which give the offender an unfair advantage, and are penalised immediately 
with a technical foul (“Knowing the Game: Basketball,” 1995). A player shall not disregard 
warnings by an official or commit unsportsmanlike actions such as:
–  delaying the game by preventing the ball from being put promptly into play
–   baiting an opponent or obstructing the opponent's vision by waving his hands close to the 
opponent's eyes
–  using profanities or disrespectfully addressing an official
–  changing his number without informing the scorer and the referee
–  entering the court as a substitute without reporting first to the scorer and then to an official
–  grasping the ring in a manner that may damage the equipment.
Similar situations can be found in other sports.
In short, since the good foul only aims at the "breaking the rules with the intention to accept 
the penalty" without necessarily entailing deception, it can hardly be seen as a form of cheating 
(see Table 1). 

48 Revisiting fair play Kinesiologia Slovenica, 11, 1, 43–49 (2005) 
Table 1: Cheating and the good foul in sport
        Cheating           Good foul 
1.  Breaking the rules (written or implicit) 
Deliberately and;
2.  Intending to deceive opponent(s) and referee(s) 
or relevant agents;
3. In order to win or gain advantage  
1.  Breaking the written rules deliberately and;
2. In order to win or gain the advantage. 
Trying to avoid the penalty Expecting and willing to accept the penalty
So far, the essential element of a good foul is quite clear. Athletes' intentions, motivations or 
at t it ude s tow a rd s sp or t s r u le s pl ay a n i mp or t a nt role i n a go o d sp or t s c onte s t . A s Fr a leig h (198 4 , 
pp. 69) says: “The attitudes of participants toward the rules are of great significance to the good 
sports contest. The attitude that is most significant is one of complete respect, and it grows out 
of several realizations by the sports participants.”
Yet, having a good intention to compete in a sports contest is not a sufficient condition for being 
a good athlete. In contrast, a player is good not only because s/he has a good intention to play a 
game but also because s/he is willing to act rightly, in accordance with the rules and their spirit, 
in participating in that game. 
IV. Concluding summary
In conclusion, a “good foul“ means that a sports player commits a foul (breaking explicit rules) 
deliberately so as to expect and be willing to accept the penalty in order to win the game or gain 
unfair advantage. A "good foul" can hardly be seen as a form of cheating, as it only aims at the 
"breaking the rules with the intention to accept the penalty" without entailing deception. A 
"good foul" is inappropriate behaviour in sport because it shows that a player does not respect 
the purpose of sport in general. 
Good fouls may be “good“ because they are desirable but it is not morally "good" on account 
of it being desired. In other words, the "good" of a good foul is not morally "good" as it is not 
universally good for all the participants in a game, but only good from the perspective of the 
rational self-interest of the violator or of his team. A "good foul" might also indicate a deficiency 
in the sports rules. Rule makers in this respect need to constantly revise inappropriate features 
of the rules of the game. As a good foul violates the spirit of the rules, it is a morally wrong 
act. 

Revisiting fair play 49 Kinesiologia Slovenica, 11, 1, 43–49 (2005) 
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