goalpost
part of speech
noun (a goalpost, goalposts)
meaning for a pupil
1) A goalpost is one of the two upright posts that mark the sides of a goal in games like football, rugby and hockey. tree →
2) «Move the goalposts» means to change the rules or the target unfairly once something has started. tree →
sense in the lessons
In sport, a goal is usually two goalposts joined by a crossbar; the ball must go between them. In rugby and Australian football the ball goes between or over tall posts. The idiom «move the goalposts» is used in everyday life and at school when someone changes what you have to do after you started. In safety, goalposts must be fixed to the ground so they cannot fall over.
examples
- The ball hit the goalpost and bounced back into play. tree →
- We used two jumpers as goalposts in the park. tree →
- In rugby you kick the ball over the crossbar and between the goalposts. tree →
- Never swing on the goalposts; they can tip over. tree →
- The goalposts were painted white so the players could see them. tree →
- It is not fair to move the goalposts after the game has started. tree →
note
One word: goalpost (sometimes «goal post»). Countable. A goal has two goalposts and a crossbar. Hitting the post is not a goal unless the ball crosses the line between the posts.
In the corpora
- It was the goalpost.
- Changing a deal after the other person has kept it is called moving the goalposts.
- Inventing a new excuse whenever the evidence goes against your belief is called moving the goalposts.
- Changing the target each time someone meets it is moving the goalposts; fair rules are clear before the race starts.
- Throwing out the results that go against you, or inventing a rule after you lose, is moving the goalposts.
Trees and pragmatics
Every meaning and example of «goalpost» parsed by Mova, each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.