VAR thread 2022/23

[eyalluvitt]

No, several were still appealing when the ball went in to Brighton’s half before being put out. McAllister ran 20 yards to ask the ref how he hadn’t seen it.

VAR had to request he look at it, especially given the many “errors” Brighton have received public apologies for over the season. It would have been a massive scandal had they ignored the blatant handball. Fairly sure Brighton would have gone full litigation.

And Mariner was absolutely crushed when he was forced to give it.

He did look crestfallen when he had to give it, The Ref and VAR ignored the blatant Liverpool handball at West Aaam recently . Maybe Brightons many highlighted VAR shaftings meant even the Teflon rags had to play by the rules tonight

 

[Bluekiwi]

The refs are crap and/or bent and the VAR team are……erm……the refs

Scrap VAR, sack the refs

The VAR team probably watching programmes such as Coronation Street or East Enders - only flicking to the games when the ads are on.

 

[Blue Maverick]

It’s ok, knower of everything Lee Dixon said no pen as he got the ball

So if a keeper does that then it’s not a penalty!

 

[crazyg]

The VAR panel for United games should be 4 Neanderthal, low IQ United fans to make it slightly less corrupt than it is now.

But, but, but......
They'd be 4 players short on matchday.

 

[Stephen230]

You don't think it's incompetence to have the stupid rules in the first place? People have difficulty, and will, quite rightly, always have difficulty understanding why they want to disallow goals for 1mm offside that no-one can see, but won't correct other decisions that everyone can see.

They really don't do themselves any favours.

I can see the arguments for and against. If you’re going to have VAR judging offside positions then IF they have the technology to more or less turn it into a factual decision, why not use it? You’re never going to make everybody happy. If they decided to ignore any offside calls that were wrong to within a metre, then you’ll still get controversy when someone is a metre + or - a mm offside

As for overturning subjective decisions like fouls, a lot of people seem to want different levels depending on the situation.

One of the most repeated comments on here is that the VAR should only interfere for the most blatant of mistakes. I can understand that argument. The common used phrase that they don’t want matches re-refereed makes sense in theory.

But then the sane people are bemoaning the system every time a possible City penalty isn’t overturned, when it clearly falls into that category. .

 

[Tb1981]

Let’s be honest the issue is simple
1 refs are bottling the big decisions because they feel VAR will let them know if it’s an issue
2 VAR ref doesn’t want to go against the on pitch ref and will avoid highlighting anything if possibel

As such there is a shocking amount of accountability that is missing
No one is willing to make a big call and it’s getting worse.

In independent VAR official who isn’t mates with the ref would be a good start
Or have a ref who is willing to make a tough call and then be told he is wrong by VAR

All in all it’s a shambles

 

[give it to gordon]

539 pages on VAR yet we probably all agree that the first step is to let the public hear the decision being made. That would be difficult in the stadium I agree when certain clubs cant fit a tv screen in their dumps.

To me it's so simple let us hear what's going on. All the time it's done behind the fans backs it will always be accused of being fixed.

The fact the authorities refuse to let the fans know to me means it is fixed, they are clearly hiding something. I am still pissed of with the rags equaliser against us. Why couldnt we hear how the ref made that decision ? Because the game is bent. But having said that to make things even more confusing VAR gave Brighton a penalty last night ! So perhaps is betting that is pulling the strings ?

 

[halfcenturyup]

One of the most repeated comments on here is that the VAR should only interfere for the most blatant of mistakes. I can understand that argument. The common used phrase that they don’t want matches re-refereed makes sense in theory.

But then the sane people are bemoaning the system every time a possible City penalty isn’t overturned, when it clearly falls into that category. .

On offside, I firmly believe you can be TOO accurate. The law wasn't written to judge if a person's toe is offside in their running stride, when the rest of their body is onside. It's just ludicrous that a player can be looking across the line, can time his run perfectly, be 100% sure by line of sight that he is onside, but be called offside because some asshole with computer tells him he had his knee, or his foot or even his toe, extended beyond the last defender because of where he was in his running stride at some moment plucked out of the air at random by same asshole. Even if you can completely judge to the nanosecond when the ball was kicked it would still be against the spirit of the game to call things like that offside, imo.

At the end of the day, though, do the benefits of VAR, and there are some, outweigh the downside of goals being disallowed for offsides that can't be detected by the human eye, the continual delays, the removal of spontaneous celebration in the ground, idiotic protocols that lead to just as many debatable decisions as before, the Rashford non-offside (which pushed me over the edge on VAR quite frankly), how many dubious handball decisions and now dives are making a comeback? And the endless fucking poetry.

From my distant standpoint, I'm not sure, and it would be interesting to hear what people who can actually go to games think.

 

[BlueHammer85]

I suppose it will always just be a constant cycle

I can point to decisions that would not have been given pre VAR, like Shaws handball, or Stones goal v Arsenal being flagged etc

likewise, there will always be a penalty or major decision that should have been given even with VAR.

… I don't think there will ever be a system that pleases. VAR can find ways to constantly evolve and improve though so that's why i will always be for it, transparency is the next phase they simply have to bring in - but still not hopeful this will please that much for those that are already preconditioned to thinking bad decisions are corrupt decisions.

 

[Gray]

Let’s be honest the issue is simple
1 refs are bottling the big decisions because they feel VAR will let them know if it’s an issue
2 VAR ref doesn’t want to go against the on pitch ref and will avoid highlighting anything if possibel

As such there is a shocking amount of accountability that is missing
No one is willing to make a big call and it’s getting worse.

In independent VAR official who isn’t mates with the ref would be a good start
Or have a ref who is willing to make a tough call and then be told he is wrong by VAR

All in all it’s a shambles

That is it in a nutshell.

 

[halfcenturyup]

I suppose it will always just be a constant cycle

I can point to decisions that would not have been given pre VAR, like Shaws handball, or Stones goal v Arsenal being flagged etc

likewise, there will always be a penalty or major decision that should have been given even with VAR.

… I don't think there will ever be a system that pleases. VAR can find ways to constantly evolve and improve though so that's why i will always be for it, transparency is the next phase they simply have to bring in - but still not hopeful this will please that much for those that are already preconditioned to thinking bad decisions are corrupt decisions.

But we could point to decisions that were right or wrong before VAR and we were all happy to do it under the cover of human error with a sidedish of bias and corruption. Now we have VAR and it was welcomed with the promise that it would do away with monumental mistakes, even to the point of accepting all the delays and rule changes to accommodate. But here we are how many years later and we are still pointing to decisions that are wrong or right. It hasn't eliminated monumental mistakes, and we are, not surprisingly, less inclined to accept human error and more inclined to go with bias and corruption.

I think that's a perfectly normal reaction tbh.

 

[BlueHammer85]

But we could point to decisions that were right or wrong before VAR and we were all happy to do it under the cover of human error with a sidedish of bias and corruption. Now we have VAR and it was welcomed with the promise that it would do away with monumental mistakes, even to the point of accepting all the delays and rule changes to accommodate. But here we are how many years later and we are still pointing to decisions that are wrong or right. It hasn't eliminated monumental mistakes, and we are, not surprisingly, less inclined to accept human error and more inclined to go with bias and corruption.

I think that's a perfectly normal reaction tbh.

Indeed I see this point.

I do think though we could have 10 games of PL football over a weekend and if there's one controversial VAR decision there's massive uproar and it's so talked about that it's 'proof' VAR doesn't work

whereas pre VAR, I'm sure the refs decision/performance was talked about for far more games over a PL weekend.

maybe just the way i see it.

I really don't see a way of swaying fans to think the games are not corrupt - there's simply way to many grey area decisions in the game and always will be.

 

[halfcenturyup]

Indeed I see this point.

I do think though we could have 10 games of PL football over a weekend and if there's one controversial VAR decision there's massive uproar and it's so talked about that it's 'proof' VAR doesn't work

whereas pre VAR, I'm sure the refs decision/performance was talked about for far more games over a PL weekend.

maybe just the way i see it.

I really don't see a way of swaying fans to think the games are not corrupt - there's simply way to many grey area decisions in the game and always will be.

Fair enough and I appreciate the conciliatory tone, but we have been down this road before I think. If a process is flawed, and is known to be flawed, but no steps are taken to improve it, then the process is corrupted. It doesn't mean money is changing hands. It just means it can be abused for whatever reason by whatever person.

We can debate whether that actually happens, of course, but it is currently way too easy to manipulate games to desired outcomes, if not match by match, then certainly over a season. I don't think anyone can argue against that possibility.

And that is down to the flaws in the process.

 

[BlueHammer85]

Fair enough and I appreciate the conciliatory tone, but we have been down this road before I think. If a process is flawed, and is known to be flawed, but no steps are taken to improve it, then the process is corrupted. It doesn't mean money is changing hands. It just means it can be abused for whatever reason by whatever person.

We can debate whether that actually happens, of course, but it is currently way too easy to manipulate games to desired outcomes, if not match by match, then certainly over a season. I don't think anyone can argue against that possibility.

And that is down to the flaws in the process.

but processes to improve VAR are being made all the time, there's been plenty of progress and rule changes since its introduction - It can always make tweeks, unfortunately it takes mistakes and time for change to happen. I get i have more faith in VAR going forward whilst also acknowledging there will always be controversy over decisions, especially very tight ones.

 

[Bluearmy]

He did look crestfallen when he had to give it, The Ref and VAR ignored the blatant Liverpool handball at West Aaam recently . Maybe Brightons many highlighted VAR shaftings meant even the Teflon rags had to play by the rules tonight

Gutted

 

[halfcenturyup]

but processes to improve VAR are being made all the time, there's been plenty of progress and rule changes since its introduction - It can always make tweeks, unfortunately it takes mistakes and time for change to happen. I get i have more faith in VAR going forward whilst also acknowledging there will always be controversy over decisions, especially very tight ones.

At least we can agree you have more faith in the process than I do. :)

In which other multi billion dollar business would you implement a key, strategic process on the basis of "let's just do it like this and then tweek it over 5 years until it works to an acceptable level"? It's unconscionable.

Unless, of course, it's deliberate.

 

[SebastianBlue]

At least we can agree you have more faith in the process than I do. :)

In which other multi billion dollar business would you implement a key, strategic process on the basis of "let's just do it like this and then tweek it over 5 years until it works to an acceptable level"? It's unconscionable.

Unless, of course, it's deliberate.

As you allude to, you wouldn’t implement a system/business process like this in any other industry unless the intention was to allow for manipulation. It was a deeply flawed system from the start and the league and PGMOL continue to refuse to make the modifications that would actually improve it (and the perception of it’s legitimacy).

Again, one mistake is accidental; three mistakes without correction is incompetence; ten mistakes without correction is corruption (as, at that point, those in a position to stop them are simply choosing not to).

There is no argument against VAR having been implemented to allow for continued attempts to influence the outcomes of match (whether ultimately successful or not) until the league and PGMOL take clear steps to eliminate the extreme variance in outcomes in officiating and VAR review involving nearly identical incidents (or the truly baffling—and often match-deciding—one-off decisions that merely result in a “we made a mistake, sorry” with no attempt to make the wronged party whole).

We are years in to its use now and it has arguably gotten worse, not better. Brighton and Wolves, to name but two clubs, would certainly agree; the former would likely be in 4th right now if not for the many “mistakes” that Webb has publicly apologised to them for. Leeds would probably join in that sentiment as they fight off relegation.

There is real financial (and reputational, in the case of the league) harm done by the farcical VAR implementation and continued operation that is not being acknowledge or resolved. And the vast majority of that is not being incurred by the league’s cash cow clubs, no matter how disingenuously the likes of Klopp would say otherwise.

That in of itself should cause everyone to question the nature and practice of VAR.

 

[manimanc]

No, several were still appealing when the ball went in to Brighton’s half before being put out. McAllister ran 20 yards to ask the ref how he hadn’t seen it.

VAR had to request he look at it, especially given the many “errors” Brighton have received public apologies for over the season. It would have been a massive scandal had they ignored the blatant handball. Fairly sure Brighton would have gone full litigation.

And Mariner was absolutely crushed when he was forced to give it.

I thought he looked gutted too.

Usually refs give it the wide screen when they have to go to the monitor, this prick looked like he was outlining a postage stamp.

Same when Oliver gave Haaland's header in the derby, looked like he was going to burst into tears awarding it.

These fuckin refs.

 

[Stephen230]

Let’s be honest the issue is simple
1 refs are bottling the big decisions because they feel VAR will let them know if it’s an issue
2 VAR ref doesn’t want to go against the on pitch ref and will avoid highlighting anything if possibel

If referees are afraid to give big decisions and the VARs aren’t inclined to overrule them, you’d have thought that would naturally lead to less penalties?

But the exact opposite is true. There’s been more penalties awarded on average per season in the VAR years than in any equivalent time frame since they started recording these things.

 

[halfcenturyup]

If referees are afraid to give big decisions and the VARs aren’t inclined to overrule them, you’d have thought that would naturally lead to less penalties?

Just out of interest, do you have the stats since Webb came in and changed the threshold for intervention mid-season?