VAR - 2020/21

[Innsbruckblue]

I’ve thought long and hard about VAR, about its benefits and disadvantages, the way it can help the game or hinder it, and this is my conclusion...

It’s f@&£in shit

 

[Len Rum]

I find it difficult to conclude that it is getting better considering we've probably just had one of the worst weeks in terms of VAR since it started. I see virtually no broad direction of improvement at all, just some periods where it's not quite as terrible and then periods where it feels like the people making the VAR decisions have completely lost their minds. There are two things that particularly bother me about VAR, firstly that the trade off before you even start is huge. You lose an awful lot of the spontaneity of the game that most of us love When you have fans saying they don't really celebrate goals that much anymore and players saying they are wary of fully celebrating goals when they score then you have significant problems IMO. Arguably that wouldn't be an acceptable trade off even if VAR was sorting out most of the injustices of incorrect refereeing decisions. When you throw in that to the untrained eye it seems to have made negligible difference to getting the "subjective" decisions right, in my view it certainly doesn't even come close to being worth the trade off.
My second issue is that I can't shift the feeling that if a referee gets something wrong in real time, it is incredibly infuriating but you can just about grudgingly accept it. For decisions to be just as bad when someone has looked at it repeatedly on replay becomes unacceptable on a completely different level. Atwell was fucking awful on Tuesday, that's one thing but for VAR to not correct even one of those decisions is beyond outrageous. Ultimately it just isn't fit for purpose for the subjective decisions and definitely isn't worth the trade off of what we lose from the game. I think they should only have VAR for factual calls and even then they need to review how they treat offsides because these mm offside calls that have essentially made "level" offside are unacceptable.

Great Post.
I occasionally watch lower league games and the play offs on TV and what a breath of fresh air it is to have spontaneity when goals are scored and not to have VAR and all it's subjective nonsense ruling them out just because somebody's knob end (male game only!) or big toe is a mm offside or the ball flicked off someone's arm twenty seconds before a goal was scored etc etc.
Get rid.
Now.

 

[Lancet Fluke]

Yeah a protocol/checklists of what to look for in common scenarios, with us hearing the ref/VAR team run through it, would improve things immeasurably

Will anything ever make a difference though as long as the totally subjective clear and obvious error line is part of any protocol? I mean that is a threshold that can mean literally anything to anyone on any incident. It effectively gives the person on VAR the opportunity to do exactly what he likes and it's more or less impossible to question.
"Hi Stuart, just hang on a moment, I'm looking at a challenge on Gundogan. Yep, he's taken him out with a high challenge to the knee cap but I don't think you even need to look at it because in my judgement it's not a clear and obvious error..."

 

[Blue Budgie]

And Lee Mason is gonna be a major part of VARCE next season too. That should be fun.

 

[Lancet Fluke]

Great Post.
I occasionally watch lower league games and the play offs on TV and what a breath of fresh air it is to have spontaneity when goals are scored and not to have VAR and all it's subjective nonsense ruling them out just because somebody's knob end (male game only!) or big toe is a mm offside or the ball flicked off someone's arm twenty seconds before a goal was scored etc etc.
Get rid.
Now.

All the controversy and supporter action against the ESL, meanwhile we have collectively allowed the authorities to ruin arguably the most fundamental part of the sport from a supporter perspective - celebrating goals.

 

[BeerIsTheBest]

And Lee Mason is gonna be a major part of VARCE next season too. That should be fun.

you are correct what joy we should experience. Is there any other business or institution (political parties and government aside) that would suspend an employee for 10 days for ineptness and a few months later promote them to a critical post?

Might as well put the guru Walton in charge.

 

[mat]

And Lee Mason is gonna be a major part of VARCE next season too. That should be fun.

Lump on a rag title.

 

[Gray]

I am not going to accept VAR whilst the organisation that supplies the match officials is also doing the verification of their decisions.

There must be an independent VAR body that is created by the FA and Premier League with agreement from the Clubs. It is common sense and I feel that some sort of petition to the Government is needed to get the matter raised in Parliament.

 

[MillionMilesAway]

VAR will check if a goalkeeper is a millimeter off his line when saving a penalty, VAR will check a possible offside, again to the nearest millimeter. It therefore surprises me, when watching a GK run to the edge of his area to kick out of hand, just how often they are over the line when they launch the ball, sometimes by a good margin. I wonder if the refs' and linos' are advised to ignore what could be classed as a sending off offence.

It's only a red card if it prevents a goalscoring

Having the ball and wandering outside the area isn't a red card offence.

 

[danielwood5]

My second issue is that I can't shift the feeling that if a referee gets something wrong in real time, it is incredibly infuriating but you can just about grudgingly accept it. For decisions to be just as bad when someone has looked at it repeatedly on replay becomes unacceptable on a completely different level.

That's the biggest issue with it for me, when referees got things wrong you could mostly just accept it. Most of the time you could understand why a referee had made a decision even if it was wrong, we've all been at games and seen stuff in real time so know how fast things happen.
Pretty much all the major controversies in football decision making have been created by the media, when you have 24 hour sports news channels they have to be filled with something and controversies are the easiest way of filling that time. "Did Balotelli stamp on poor Scotty Parker, well be discussing this over the next 4 hours so be sure to text in and let us know what you think".
Manufactured controversies for the stay at home audience, the reason we have VAR is to rectify these "controversies" and to give the armchair fans something to watch but it's sucked all the enjoyment out of the game for match going fans and for those fans who just want to watch a game of football and enjoy celebrating goals scored.
VAR hasn't removed the controversial and incorrect decisions, has made diving worse and made offsides become more favourable to the defenders so what is the point in it? How has it made the game better?