Field goal

This article is about a kick to score in gridiron football. For other uses, see Field goal (disambiguation).

Younghoe Koo (right) of the Atlanta Falcons attempts a field goal, while Cameron Nizialek (left) serves as the holder.
A set of gridiron football goal posts—two uprights (vertical) and a crossbar (horizontal)

A field goal (FG) is a means of scoring in gridiron football. To score a field goal, the team in possession of the ball must place kick, or drop kick, the ball through the goal, i.e., between the uprights and over the crossbar.[1] The entire ball must pass through the vertical plane of the goal, which is the area above the crossbar and between the uprights or, if above the uprights, between their outside edges.[a] American football requires that a field goal must only come during a play from scrimmage (except in the case of a fair catch kick) while Canadian football retains open field kicks and thus field goals may be scored at any time from anywhere on the field and by any player. The vast majority of field goals, in both codes, are placekicked. Drop-kicked field goals were common in the early days of gridiron football but are almost never attempted in modern times. A field goal may also be scored through a fair catch kick, but this is also extremely rare. In most leagues, a successful field goal awards three points (a notable exception is six-man football in which, due to the small number of players available to stop the opposing team from blocking the kick, a field goal is worth four points).[2]

Since a field goal is worth only three points, as opposed to a touchdown, which is worth six points, it is usually only attempted in specific situations (see Strategy).

The goal structure consists of a horizontal crossbar suspended 10 feet (3.0 m) above the ground, with two vertical goalposts 18 feet 6 inches (5.64 m) apart extending vertically from each end of the crossbar.[3] In American football, the goals are centered on each end line; in Canadian football, they are centered on each goal line.

  1. ^ "Scoring Plays". National Football League. Retrieved February 11, 2022.
  2. ^ "A Few Basic Rules of Six-Man Football" South Dakota Public Broadcasting. Retrieved 2023-11-15.
  3. ^ http://static.nfl.com/static/content/public/image/rulebook/pdfs/4_2012_Field.pdf Archived September 3, 2013, at the Wayback Machine [bare URL PDF]


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