FIFA president Sepp Blatter has apparently discussed the effect of scrapping the offside rule with president of the International Hockey Federation, Leandro Negre.
Hockey scrapped the offside rule in their game in 1998, and the move is generally perceived as having made the game more entertaining for spectators.
There has been speculation that FIFA could soon be planning some kind of similar rule change in football.
Negre revealed that Blatter had spoken to him informally but at length about the impact of the rule change in the sport, but did not give him a conclusive final opinion on the matter.
"He asked me a lot of questions about it and how successful it was, although he never offered an opinion, so it was difficult to judge what football might do," said Negre, according to Sky Sports.
"But he did seem very interested in how we had implemented it."
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