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

Would you want VAR scrapped?

  • Total voters
    293
  • Poll closed .
FIFA has just trialled their ‘Video Support’ ( VR ) system for the first time, at a youth tournament and declared it a success.

Some are calling it ‘VAR light’ which is a bit misleading because it doesn’t actually involve a VAR.

The intention is for non elite leagues without the resources or infrastructure to implement VAR, to have a form of video review. It is done entirely by the referee checking a monitor at the request of the coaches. Two losing reviews per team allowed. They must be specific appeals based on the four current principles of VAR and the 4th official will decide if it is a legitimate appeal before informing the referee. You can’t for example just ask the referee to look at a goal in the hope that some offence or other has occurred.

Further tests are imminent and it could be available for leagues to request using it, maybe for the ‘25-‘26 season if all goes well.

It isn’t FIFA’s intention that VS will be an option for elite leagues. But who knows?

You could in theory have a situation in a few years where the Championship and Leagues 1 and 2 are using VS and everybody is loving it. While the Premier League continues to have problems with VAR.

In that scenario you could possibly see elite leagues pushing for VR to be an option they can use also.
 
Gorton_Tubster said:
VAR is even responsible for the stupid stupid lino not raising his flag. Its just another example of how VAR has changed the whole game. Its not even about the amount of incorrect decisions that still happen, its about how its changed the game.

Take it out, fix it, let the ref ref and give him the ability to use VAR.
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The problem with reviewing offsides in any capacity (even if the review gets it right) is that it's impossible to re-establish the continuity that would have occurred had the call been made by the Lino in real-time. If the Lino raises his flag, the run of play stops and it results in a free kick for the opposition. If VAR ends up reviewing it and determines that the Lino was wrong for putting his flag up, then there's no adaquate corrective action that would be able to occur to re-establish the run of play that would have existed had the Lino (correctly) kept the flag down. You've lost that continuity and being able to see what would have happened had the play continued. Giving a free kick to the team that was incorrect called offside is not the same as if the play would have been allowed to continue naturally. You've lost the continuity, which creates a pandora's box to urge Linos to keep the flag down, which creates the opposite problem.

If the Lino keeps his flag down the run of play continues. In either scenario, to review an offsides decision, you sacrifice the naturally occurring result had the decision been made in real-time. Like if the Lino keeps his flag down, to allow a review, well during that time the play will continue until there is a stoppage. A goal could be scored during that time, a penalty could be given during that time, something will happen during the time in which the Lino would keep his flag down to allow a review. Then, in order for that entire sequence that to be deemed to exist, the review would have to concur with the Lino keeping his flag down (which lets face it, is a rarity when a possible offsides goes to review after the Lino keeps his flag down).

Anotherwords, even if a VAR review ends up reversing the on field decision for offsides, after the Lino kept his flag down to allow the review, you've then rendered a sequence of on field action to not have existed in which the fans at the time aren't sure if it will stand. This is why for offsides, even if the Lino keeps his flag down to allow a review, even if the review happens and they correctly see an offsides, you've still created a continuity problem. Anotherwords, it's not a satisfactory decision when a Lino keeps his flag down, then a VAR review confirms an offside because you've lost the continuity. And the opposite of that, lets say a Lino calls for offsides, and a review turns out that he was wrong and it wasn't offside. Well then, again you've lost the ability to have had the play continue naturally as it would have had the Lino (correctly) kept his flag down to begin with.

So either way, as it pertains to offsides, there's never a situation in which a VAR review is superior than an instinctive decision by the Lino. Even if VAR corrects a bad decision by the Lino for a player being offsides, it's never going to be as good as the instinctive decision being correct, because you, no matter what, always lose continuity when there is a VAR review for offsides.

So regardless of how much better the supposed semi-automatic offsides is, it'll never be better than a Lino making the decision in real-time and getting that correct. Arguably even if the Lino gets a borderline offsides wrong (offsides by a toenail, offsides by a nose, etc) the fact that you will always sacrifice continuity to get the call correct upon review, it's arguable better still for the Lino to get the call slightly wrong when it's too close to call on the naked eye anyway, rather than always been guaranteed to lose the natural continuity of the play upon a review.

So this is why offsides will always be better without VAR, even if they improve the technology to make seeing it upon review accurately, you still always lose the continuity that would have occurred had the Lino made the call in real-time. That's why offsides should never be reviewed, because even if it corrects a call on the field, you'll always lose the continuity, you always lose the ability to see how the run of play would have played out naturally.

If the Lino keeps his flag down, and it turns into a review, after lets say a goal is scored when being allowed to play on, you've compounded the controversy, because then we've seen what happened when the flag was allowed to stay down, then you're not only reversing the offside call, but you're then disallowing a goal. And lets say a goal wasn't scored upon the run of play that was allowed to continue when the Lino kept his flag down to allow a VAR review, that run of play still happened, and then upon a reversal that run of play (even if nothing happened) is then deemed to never exist. You've lost the continuity. Lets say an injury occurs, or a goalie makes a save, or a foul occurred, even outside the box. Then all that happened ends up not happening and that's fundamentally wrong. So as far as offside, it's unsatisfactory even if the Lino keeps his flag down, even if a review gets the call right. You're guaranteed to lose the continuity.

That's why offsides should never be reviewed by VAR, it only works (properly) with the Lino making instinctive decisions in real-time, otherwise continuity is lose, and continuity being lost in offsides situations is unsatisfactory. And that's not even factoring in the situations when there's a player clearly offsides but then it becomes a judgement call as to whether or not he was involved in the play. Then you have another layer which requires a human subjective ruling. All this should be tasked with the Lino. There will be errors, but you'll never lost continuity. The glaring howler missed offsides is quite rare, and even if it happens once in a blue moon it does not justify all the lack of continuity, delays, and additional controversy and that using VAR for offside decisions causes.
 
PL ref officiating the play off game tonight, no Var, misses as clear a penalty as you will see then later awards a penalty when there was no contact. 2 key decisions, both wrong.
 
hertsblue said:
PL ref officiating the play off game tonight, no Var, misses as clear a penalty as you will see then later awards a penalty when there was no contact. 2 key decisions, both wrong.
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The one area that VAR could possibly be a legitimate help is as it pertains to penalty decisions. But it's a very slippery slope, as we've seen. I'll be the first to admit that there are *some* situations in which VAR has corrected faulty penalty decision given on the pitch. A good example is in the Brighton & Hove Albion match against Chelsea.



Watch the clip on youtube : See 0:16 - 1:11 in the video.

The tackle by Facundo Buonanotte in the box on Cucurella, a penalty was given by the referee, as the referee did not have a good angle to see the slide tackle clearly. He sees Cucurella come down and gives a penalty, Buonanotte is apoplectic because he knows he made a great tackle, and he did. The reverse angle shows a much clearer view than the referee had, and you can see from the reverse angle that Buonanotte got to the ball first. It was a great tackle, and upon the VAR review, the decision was reversed, and no penalty was given.

Now, you could say, this kind of situation is exactly what VAR is for and why we have it. However, this is what I would say to that. While I agree it was a great tackle, and he got to the ball first, if you watch it closely, there was a lot of jostling back and forth between Buonanotte and Cucurella prior to the play on the ball. Buonanotte first pressed his elbow against Cucurella's shoulder then Buonanotte pushed his hand firmly against Cucurella's stomach prior to making the great slide tackle. Now, you could argue that Buonanotte committed a foul in the penalty area by putting his hand on the stomach of Cucurella which seemed to give him the leverage to get into position to successfully make the slide tackle to begin with. If he didn't use his hands prior to making the slide tackle, would he have been able to get out in front like that and get the ball first before bringing him down? I'm not sure that he would have been able to make that kind of tackle without the pushing off with his hands.

What I'm saying is that, while it was clear that he made a great slide tackle, got to the ball before bringing down Cucurella, which resulted in the penalty being overturned, his putting his hands on Cucurella prior to the slide tackle was still arguably a foul. Now you might say, well they both were using their hands, but that's subjective and there's a definite argument that Buonanotte was only able to make that successful slide tackle by using his hands against the upper body of Cucurella to get him into position to get to the ball on that slide tackle. That said, I have no problem with that call being reversed, and that this situation is about as good of an argument to have VAR as there is. But what I'm saying is, even then, there's still an argument that it could have been a penalty due to the jostling and putting his hands on his upper body prior to the slide tackle. But again, that's debatable, and I'm not making the argument that it should have been a penalty. I'm fine with that being overturned, all I'm saying is it's still somewhat arguable as a penalty due to the hands on his upper body prior to the slide tackle. (which unsurprisingly no one's talking about)

But onto a larger issue, what makes this situation a good argument for having VAR is that, this was a situation in which a penalty was given on the pitch, which means that continuity had already been stopped by that penalty decision. Also, the ball was kicked out of play for a corner on the slide tackle, so in the event that a penalty wasn't given upon a VAR review, you could go right to a corner kick since it would have been out on Buonanotte. So no matter what decision VAR made there, no continuity would have been lost either way. It's either a corner to Chelsea or a penalty to Chelsea.

However, what I'm trying to point out here is that, a situation like that in which no continuity would be lost upon a VAR review for penalty / no pen is exceedingly rare!!

If a penalty is given on a situation in which the ball did not go out of play on a slide tackle like that, lets say there was just a foul inside the box, penalty given and the ball was still in play when the ref made that decision, if a VAR review ends up determining no pen, you've then lost the natural continuity that would have occurred had the play been allowed continue. (similar to what I described for ALL offsides situations)

What I would say about VAR and penalty decisions, is that there is a legitimate argument that in *some* situations in which a penalty is given, that it's worth it for the referee to go to the monitor after a penalty decision is given on the field. But as I pointed out, unless the ball went out of play right as the penalty was given on the pitch (like on a situation like the slide tackle by Buonanotte) you're still losing the continuity upon a reversal of no pen.

Now, there's an argument that losing the continuity even if the ball stayed in play and penalty was incorrectly given on the pitch and reversed upon review is better than giving a penalty incorrectly. And to that, I would agree. However, we must keep in mind that we're still losing continuity in most cases, even if a pen / no pen is correctly reversed upon a VAR review. And lets take opposite case, which unlike when a pen is given incorrectly on the pitch then reversed upon a VAR review, if a penalty is missed, then a foul is observed and play is stopped unnaturally to review, then similar to all offsides VAR reviews, you are guaranteed to lose continuity even if the VAR review correctly sees a penalty and decides to give a penalty.

This is the problem, in that, yes, occasionally there's a seemingly perfect VAR example like the Buonanotte / Cucurella slide tackle in which it seemed as if VAR corrected a missed call on the pitch, and it just so happened that due to the slide tackle going out for a corner kick, you ended up not losing any continuity. However, that kind of situation in which you don't lose continuity upon a VAR review for a pen / no pen is exceedingly rare, and even if a penalty was given and VAR wasn't there to correct it according to the slide tackle, there's still an argument that it could have been a penalty due to the jostling prior to the slide tackle and Buonanotte all over Cucurella's upper body which arguable allowed him to make such a great slide tackle to begin with.

What I would say to those who say don't bin VAR, just improve it, is, if VAR only intervened on situations like that, in which a player was brought down in the box, and a ref gives a penalty. With play already stopped due to the decision, to take a look to see another angle, I would say generally that's probably a benefit to the game, as it sometimes would correct a missed view of a slide tackle like that from the ref.

However, as I pointed out, these types of situations are exceedingly rare when VAR intervenes to correct a situation like that. But I would say that it's better when VAR intervenes for a penalty that was already given on the pitch, as that causes the match to be stopped in preparation for the PK, which is a good time for the play to be reviewed, since the match had already been stopped naturally by the on field referee giving a penalty . . . rather than a potential penalty that was missed by the referee, and then for the match to be unnaturally stopped to review a potential penalty. Then, like for all offsides decision as I mentioned earlier, regardless of if they get the call correct, and see a penalty they may have missed, they've already broken the natural continuity of the match. No matter what they decide upon a VAR review at that point (i.e. lets say they uphold the decision on the pitch of no pen) you've already lost the run of play as it was occurring naturally before you stopped the match to review, and you can never get that back.

So what I'm pointing out here is that VAR (in most cases, aside from the rare Buonanotte / Cucurella type of situation where a pen was given on the pitch and the ball was kicked out of play on the slide tackle) you're always disrupting the natural flow of the match to stop the match for VAR. You can never resume it as it was with a free kick given, as opposed to whatever was happening when a match was stopped. You can never get that back is the point here, which is why it's far too disruptive to the natural order of a match, to the natural flow of the match, even if a VAR decision gets it right and corrects a call on the pitch. In most cases, you've still lost the continuity and what would have happened had VAR not gotten involved no matter what.
 
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SWP's back said:
This is very interesting, The Athletic ran a vote on whether VAR should be scrapped and it seems City fans were the least likely to be in favour of it being scrapped.

View attachment 119274

Just goes to show that Bluemoon isn’t an exact barometer of the feels of all City fans.

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/54...lubs-to-scrap-var/?source=user_shared_article
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That’s because we got absolutely shafted on numerous occasions pre VAR
I just watched one of those whole season videos on YouTube where they show highlights from every one of our games
2018-19
Some of the decisions (particularly pens not given) were horrendous
VAR has been a shambles because the standard of the refs is so poor and the idiot on VAR always seems so reluctant to overrule the on field ref
It needs changes (they should let us hear all the audio in real time straight away for a start) but I’m not in favour of binning it
 
KS55 said:
That’s why you need independent assessors and accountability.
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Not sure I buy the argument about PL referees being worse than anywhere else (if they are left to it) but you are spot on here. And by independent I am guessing you don't mean populated by PL and PGMOL people in the usual PL manner?
 
Andy TheCatalyst Morrison said:
Still don’t believe you I’m afraid
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Tbf, of course there was uproar and outrage towards the officials at almost every game pre-VAR, as there is now with VAR and as there will be post this vote, whatever happens. That isn't the point, though.

The point is to balance getting as many decisions as possible "right" with keeping the spirit of the game that has made it so popular for over more than a century.

Honestly, I'm not sure football as we know and love it is made for too much VAR involvement. The speed of the action, the lack of regular action breaks, the subjectivity of the rules, the impact of VAR decisions on what is, after all, a low scoring sport and so on lead me to believe it should just get involved for "howlers". Of course, people will micro-analyse what is clear and obvious and complain about it, but that will always be the case. At least re-install the authority of the officials and don't slow down the game.

If you are worried about players conning referees, use VAR to punish them retrospectively.

I said before, I like what Webb is doing with accepting the referee's decisions unless "clear and obvious". Just do the same for offsides, ffs.
 
halfcenturyup said:
Or it shows that City fans that subscribe to the Athletic, presumably at least 8 of them if they got 38%, aren't an exact barometer of the feelings of all City fans?
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Well the current poll has less than 50% of wanting to scrap VAR - that’s despite the vast majority of posts in here have that been calling it a shambles , a tool to help Man U/Liverpool and calling me a WUM for my defence of having VAR in the game.
 
halfcenturyup said:
Or it shows that City fans that subscribe to the Athletic, presumably at least 8 of them if they got 38%, aren't an exact barometer of the feelings of all City fans?
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It’s just as likely to be more representative than this thread when the same dozen people moan every fucking week. There’s over 100,000 users on Bluemoon, how many post to slag off VAR every week?

This thread just serves as confirmation bias where maybe only the most strident critics feel the need to comment on it whilst the majority can’t even be arsed as it’s like arguing against religious fanatics.
 
the talisman said:
That’s because we got absolutely shafted on numerous occasions pre VAR
I just watched one of those whole season videos on YouTube where they show highlights from every one of our games
2018-19
Some of the decisions (particularly pens not given) were horrendous
VAR has been a shambles because the standard of the refs is so poor and the idiot on VAR always seems so reluctant to overrule the on field ref
It needs changes (they should let us hear all the audio in real time straight away for a start) but I’m not in favour of binning it
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Exactly. People have very short memories. We get shafted far far less post-VAR than we used to get.

Totally agree we should be able to hear, in real time, what the VAR is saying. It winds me up to fuck that the commentators are able to hear the discussion between ref and var.
 
Var or not, same shit officials will still run the games. If the home product is shit, might as well outsource while you invest to make better home products.

However, having seen a campaign by uefa a few months back to be a ref, seems like there’s a shortage of refs anyway in the game.
 
Josh_D said:
Var or not, same shit officials will still run the games. If the home product is shit, might as well outsource while you invest to make better home products.

However, having seen a campaign by uefa a few months back to be a ref, seems like there’s a shortage of refs anyway in the game.
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Who’d want to be a ref, even when you make the correct decision you have opposing fans accusing you of corruption , cheating and calling you a ****. So many blame the authorities yet don’t see themselves how biased, wrong and abusive they are. Got a few guys round me who I swear just go to matches to let off their anger issues at the ref. It’s embarrassing.
 
SWP's back said:
It’s just as likely to be more representative than this thread when the same dozen people moan every fucking week. There’s over 100,000 users on Bluemoon, how many post to slag off VAR every week?

This thread just serves as confirmation bias where maybe only the most strident critics feel the need to comment on it whilst the majority can’t even be arsed as it’s like arguing against religious fanatics.
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It's probably most likely that neither population is representative of the whole fanbase and it's disingenuous to claim one is more of a reliable indicator than the other.

Fwiw, this particular religious fanatic voted to sit on the fence, but I'm just off to change it to definitely scrap it now my integrity has been impugned :)
 
hertsblue said:
PL ref officiating the play off game tonight, no Var, misses as clear a penalty as you will see then later awards a penalty when there was no contact. 2 key decisions, both wrong.
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The first one looked like a PL referee who is used to having VAR there and rather than make what seemed the obvious decision in real time to give the penalty - waited to see what VAR said - but of course it said nothing. A view that of course doesn't work for the second one - which looked fairly similar - so perhaps he knew by then that he had got the first one wrong and so erred on the side of giving this one - and got it wrong again!

As to the whole argument - I'm unsure. Like most people - I hate the uncertainty of celebrating a goal and then waiting ages whilst they draw lines and then judge a decision by millimetres - it's not a game to be judged by millimetres (other than John Stones clearance v Liverpool) I hope that the semi-automatic system will improve that - certainly seems more reliable when seen in acton.

With foul play, especially penalties - they have to only interfere when it is obvious - anything that involves peering at loads of camera angles for minutes is not obvious - and comes back to the onfield decision. Those decisions will always be subjective and therefore will always be flawed - however grating at the time, we need to live with that.

But football has been slow to learn from others. I really like the way Rugby does it - the person in control is the onfield referee - watching on the screen along with everyone in the stadium, with the discussion shared so that at least everyone can be aware of the decision making process. In the end you might still not agree - but usually you will end up (sometimes reluctantly) doing so.
 
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