VAR Discussion Thread - 2023/24 | PL clubs to vote on whether to scrap VAR (pg413)

[Pingu the Penguin]

There could be I agree and as much as I want it scrapped, I know that’s not going to happen now so got to focus on that instead. I just don’t like anything that alters the match day experience at the top level compared to others - I get it works for other sports but there’s a lot more objective decisions involved in those rather than subjective.

There’s absolutely improvements that can be made though, particularly in the objective decisions. They can be automated more and sped up at least. The subjective decisions, if they can get to a point where they share the audio then great. I get the challenge of doing that though.

You basically don’t need a VAR room at all if you treat VAR as tool to help refs make better decisions. You just need tech guys to cue up footage and the ref can then view it. I’d put a 1 minute clock on those on the basis that if you can’t decide it in a minute your original decision is likely to be correct (or at least not clearly and obviously wrong).

Offsides are very tricky and I’m not sure the tech is accurate in any form. Its accuracy or not is certainly not transparent. It’s not safe to use because of this for me, but tech will catch up and make it better in time at which point it should be used

 

[BlueHammer85]

I think the issue is, referees are judged by impossible standards against rules that aren't fit for purpose and are ever-changing with technology.

A lot of it VAR is to blame but VAR in essence isn't a problem, it's the rules brought in to accommodate VAR are a problem. It's this implementation of the rules that has a lot of us sick to death of VAR.

Clear and obvious needs a rethink.
VAR: What did you see happen?
Ref: I saw this...
VAR: That's fine or review on monitor and make your own decision (do not show incident in slow motion).

The handball rule. Last year I actually thought was working. In essence every handball where the arm was away from the body was a penalty. It was wrong from a deliberate standpoint but at least it was consistent. They've moved away from this now though, where some are given and some arent and I get why this is happening. Most handballs just aren't deliberate, including the Young one, the Grealish one and Wan Bissaka's one against Coventry which all happened at the weekend. They either need to go back to accidental handball or awarding every pen again. The in-between just leads to more inconsistencies.

The PGMOL does need to improve the standard but I get why its hard to do. Lower leagues dont have VAR so the training pathway is much harder. Plus who'd be a ref at the moment with the abuse they get. I probably would given the money they get but the abuse is brutal.

I do think clubs and fans need to grow up with the statements put out. I'm sick to death of hearing about the officials every week, they make mistakes and have been making them for decades. The talk around it in the last few years has gotten worse. Sometimes they're shit but a lot of the time it only gets called out because the team that are calling out the decisions have been just as shit that day.

Sometimes though the officials aren't as shit as some think. TNT's commentators were essentially calling the referee in the Lille-Villa game an idiot last week for failing to send Martinez off in the shootout. It wasn't until a producer pointed out the rules around yellow cards in shootouts had changed that they realised they were wrong. Did they apologise though? Did they fuck.

Semi-automated offsides are coming in, that's worked in Europe and the World Cup, so there's one change that makes the game better and hopefully helps referees.

I know that reads like I'm defending PGMOL, I'm not, as an organisation they are a mess, the training isn't up to standard and they've not done enough to simplify the implementation of the rules. It does feel like a mess of a job to do though.

I suppose I'm just sick of it being about decisions the ref has made every week and not the football being played on the pitch. Forest have scored the 4th least goals and conceded the 5th most, on top of having 4 points deducted. The refs aren't the only reason they're fighting relegation.

Agree with a lot of this , we have a blame culture in this nation and absolutely love moaning- I’ve always said I’d happily scrap VAR if everyone accepted the refs decisions - but they don’t , it’s constant whinging, moaning and tons of abuse towards the refs and officials. It will never change and social media has heightened everything even more.
Well bored of it all to be honest.

 

[meltonblue]

You basically don’t need a VAR room at all if you treat VAR as tool to help refs make better decisions. You just need tech guys to cue up footage and the ref can then view it. I’d put a 1 minute clock on those on the basis that if you can’t decide it in a minute your original decision is likely to be correct (or at least not clearly and obviously wrong).

Offsides are very tricky and I’m not sure the tech is accurate in any form. Its accuracy or not is certainly not transparent. It’s not safe to use because of this for me, but tech will catch up and make it better in time at which point it should be used

Thing with the subjective decisions is which ones do they decide to tee up?

 

[bluethrunthru]

Forest yesterday and now this ...........white elephant? I always thought it was going to be.

 

[Coljj]

Offsides are very tricky and I’m not sure the tech is accurate in any form. Its accuracy or not is certainly not transparent. It’s not safe to use because of this for me, but tech will catch up and make it better in time at which point it should be used

The tech is already available, hopefully everyone will be accept it like they have in UEFA competitions, the final decision and 3D render result it produces.

At least it takes it out of the hands of a VAR official telling tech guys what angle & frame and how many pixels across to line things up against.

 

[halfcenturyup]

It seems certain to me that it was pre planned. The Twitter person for a professional football club won’t be given licence to Tweet things like that off their own back. And this Tweet was sent, I read, five minutes after the final whistle.

It’s the “Exploring all options”nonsense that gets me. What exactly are these options, except for publicly crying about how hard done by they are? As they seem to have been doing ever since they got promoted.

Isn't that exactly what Liverpool said?

Edit: "In the meantime, we will explore the range of options available, given the clear need for escalation and resolution." Pretty sure they didn't get pilloried for that.

 

[halfcenturyup]

I think the issue is, referees are judged by impossible standards against rules that aren't fit for purpose and are ever-changing with technology.

A lot of it VAR is to blame but VAR in essence isn't a problem, it's the rules brought in to accommodate VAR are a problem. It's this implementation of the rules that has a lot of us sick to death of VAR.

Clear and obvious needs a rethink.
VAR: What did you see happen?
Ref: I saw this...
VAR: That's fine or review on monitor and make your own decision (do not show incident in slow motion).

The handball rule. Last year I actually thought was working. In essence every handball where the arm was away from the body was a penalty. It was wrong from a deliberate standpoint but at least it was consistent. They've moved away from this now though, where some are given and some arent and I get why this is happening. Most handballs just aren't deliberate, including the Young one, the Grealish one and Wan Bissaka's one against Coventry which all happened at the weekend. They either need to go back to accidental handball or awarding every pen again. The in-between just leads to more inconsistencies.

The PGMOL does need to improve the standard but I get why its hard to do. Lower leagues dont have VAR so the training pathway is much harder. Plus who'd be a ref at the moment with the abuse they get. I probably would given the money they get but the abuse is brutal.

I do think clubs and fans need to grow up with the statements put out. I'm sick to death of hearing about the officials every week, they make mistakes and have been making them for decades. The talk around it in the last few years has gotten worse. Sometimes they're shit but a lot of the time it only gets called out because the team that are calling out the decisions have been just as shit that day.

Sometimes though the officials aren't as shit as some think. TNT's commentators were essentially calling the referee in the Lille-Villa game an idiot last week for failing to send Martinez off in the shootout. It wasn't until a producer pointed out the rules around yellow cards in shootouts had changed that they realised they were wrong. Did they apologise though? Did they fuck.

Semi-automated offsides are coming in, that's worked in Europe and the World Cup, so there's one change that makes the game better and hopefully helps referees.

I know that reads like I'm defending PGMOL, I'm not, as an organisation they are a mess, the training isn't up to standard and they've not done enough to simplify the implementation of the rules. It does feel like a mess of a job to do though.

I suppose I'm just sick of it being about decisions the ref has made every week and not the football being played on the pitch. Forest have scored the 4th least goals and conceded the 5th most, on top of having 4 points deducted. The refs aren't the only reason they're fighting relegation.

I don't mind defending referees at all. It was a difficult job before VAR and it's a difficult job with VAR. I don't even mind the high bar on overturning on-field decisions (how can I, I would happily scrap the whole thing). But what needs to happen is to reverse out all the changes, primarily to handball and offside, that have been made to make VAR easier, but in reality make referees' decisions harder and less easy to be consistent (especially if they rarely get overturned anyway).

They should be making the referee's job easier, not making VAR's job easier. Bring back the simple deliberate handball rule and, for the love of God, get rid of mm offsides and have the same high bar for overturning offsides. Don't be fooled by SAOT, it will be just as inaccurate and with less available scrutiny than the present system. Nice graphic doesn't equal accuracy.

Forest's statement? Who cares? If they feel that strongly, they should complain. They choose to tweet right after the game? Whatever. They don't have proof? Maybe they do. Clattenburg knows how it works. Not sure the PL should be taking him on, tbh. All in all, it's just another area where the PL are losing control. They really are having a bad year organisationally.

 

[halfcenturyup]

Agree with a lot of this , we have a blame culture in this nation and absolutely love moaning- I’ve always said I’d happily scrap VAR if everyone accepted the refs decisions - but they don’t , it’s constant whinging, moaning and tons of abuse towards the refs and officials. It will never change and social media has heightened everything even more.
Well bored of it all to be honest.

Blame culture, you say? Sounds like you are blaming people for the mess VAR has created. :)

You will never get rid of referee abuse. Jesus, it was there in the 60s when I first started going. It has always been there and it will always be there. Half the people in the ground will always disagree with a 50/50 decision even when it is fairly refereed. The real problem is the broadcasters and the press (the way VAR has been introduced hasn't helped). They stoke up controversy so much that it eventually leads to a "mob mentality" and outrage. VAR is the PL's "115 charges". Karma.

You will never get a situation where all fans will accept all a referee's decisions all the time, VAR or no VAR. That's not an argument for keeping it as it is.

The whole fuss over VAR would go away if their "high bar" was applied to everything (fouls, handballs, offsides). There would be one or two overturns a year and the rest of the time fans would have to suck it up and accept that referees are human and will make small mistakes, like in the old days when I were a lad, even if they don't like it.

 

[Nightmare Walking]

Getting rid of VAR will not make any things better. It will still be the same incompetent idiots in charge, making the decisions. It was not the software that decided not to award penalties, or give offside.
VAR would have been a good thing if it was implemented properly.
Semi automatic offsides is a step in the right direction. Take that decision away from the clowns.
Limit VAR to one appeal per half. The appeal has to be submitted by the captain, on the field. Don't let manages have replays on the sidelines. If an appeal goes in, the ref goes to the sidelines. He should see all angles once, in real time. The fans should also get to see these replays on the big screen. The ref should be mic'ed up and give a brief explanation of his decision.
This way, teams can still ensure they don't get fucked over because the ref made a genuine mistake or did not see properly. The ref remains totally accountable. The fans in the stadium are fully involved and it does not take vast swathes of time out of the game.
VAR is not the problem. Used correctly, it can be a good addition to the game. It's the idiots who have tried to implement it who are the problem. There is no need for idiots, hiding behind a screen. Give the on field ref some assistance, make them accountable and involved / inform all the fans with what is happening.
It is really not difficult to implement this properly.
Maybe they just don't want to do it properly as it keeps them all in a job.

 

[Inter Me Nan]

Getting rid of VAR will not make any things better. It will still be the same incompetent idiots in charge, making the decisions. It was not the software that decided not to award penalties, or give offside.
VAR would have been a good thing if it was implemented properly.
Semi automatic offsides is a step in the right direction. Take that decision away from the clowns.
Limit VAR to one appeal per half. The appeal has to be submitted by the captain, on the field. Don't let manages have replays on the sidelines. If an appeal goes in, the ref goes to the sidelines. He should see all angles once, in real time. The fans should also get to see these replays on the big screen. The ref should be mic'ed up and give a brief explanation of his decision.
This way, teams can still ensure they don't get fucked over because the ref made a genuine mistake or did not see properly. The ref remains totally accountable. The fans in the stadium are fully involved and it does not take vast swathes of time out of the game.
VAR is not the problem. Used correctly, it can be a good addition to the game. It's the idiots who have tried to implement it who are the problem. There is no need for idiots, hiding behind a screen. Give the on field ref some assistance, make them accountable and involved / inform all the fans with what is happening.
It is really not difficult to implement this properly.
Maybe they just don't want to do it properly as it keeps them all in a job.

This.