VAR thread 2022/23

[Stephen230]

Colour me confused, no wait, colour me absolutely fucking baffled

VAR was sold to the masses on the basis it was there to correct "clear and obvious errors".
Post introduction, this was amended to "clear and obvious errors except for offside which is factual and not open to interpretation"
After todays 98th minute debacle in the Tunisia v France game, I'm once again confused as to what the remit of VAR is with regards offside.
If VAR decided it's offside, then why is the referee asked to review the decision on the telly? By their own rules of implementation it is either offside or it's not.

I was a VAR fan originally, I thought it would reduce the "variation" in decisions we see week in and week out. Instead it has created far more controversy than it has resolved, and today i finally moved into the fuck it off camp

You probably won’t like the answer because it revolves around the complicated subject of what constitutes a “deliberate play” of the ball. These are the words of a journalist who understands the laws of the game and the workings of VAR better than anyone else I know about:

—-

If the officials believed Talbi had made a "deliberate play," the phase is reset, Griezmann is onside and the goal counts.

If the officials believed Talbi hasn't made a "deliberate play," the phase isn't reset, Griezmann remains offside from Tchouameni's pass, and the goal is disallowed.


Essentially, a "deliberate play" is about the defender being in control of his actions. It's not purely about a player trying to kick or head a ball. If the defender has to stretch to play the ball, and can't have true influence about where it goes, that's not considered a "deliberate play."

This is a hugely subjective area of the offside law, which is why referee Matthew Conger of New Zealand had to go to the pitchside monitor to make the decision.

——-

So the answer to your question as to why it wasn’t a matter of fact decision and was handed back down to the referee to decide is that it hinged on a subjective interpretation of whether a “deliberate play” was made. Interestingly the guy on VAR was the same one who referred the Portugal penalty back to the referee the other night.

 

[Colin Bells Boots]

Colour me confused, no wait, colour me absolutely fucking baffled

VAR was sold to the masses on the basis it was there to correct "clear and obvious errors".
Post introduction, this was amended to "clear and obvious errors except for offside which is factual and not open to interpretation"
After todays 98th minute debacle in the Tunisia v France game, I'm once again confused as to what the remit of VAR is with regards offside.
If VAR decided it's offside, then why is the referee asked to review the decision on the telly? By their own rules of implementation it is either offside or it's not.

I was a VAR fan originally, I thought it would reduce the "variation" in decisions we see week in and week out. Instead it has created far more controversy than it has resolved, and today i finally moved into the fuck it off camp

Welcome to the long time converted .

 

[Blue Mist]

You probably won’t like the answer because it revolves around the complicated subject of what constitutes a “deliberate play” of the ball. These are the words of a journalist who understands the laws of the game and the workings of VAR better than anyone else I know about:

—-

If the officials believed Talbi had made a "deliberate play," the phase is reset, Griezmann is onside and the goal counts.

If the officials believed Talbi hasn't made a "deliberate play," the phase isn't reset, Griezmann remains offside from Tchouameni's pass, and the goal is disallowed.


Essentially, a "deliberate play" is about the defender being in control of his actions. It's not purely about a player trying to kick or head a ball. If the defender has to stretch to play the ball, and can't have true influence about where it goes, that's not considered a "deliberate play."

This is a hugely subjective area of the offside law, which is why referee Matthew Conger of New Zealand had to go to the pitchside monitor to make the decision.

——-

So the answer to your question as to why it wasn’t a matter of fact decision and was handed back down to the referee to decide is that it hinged on a subjective interpretation of whether a “deliberate play” was made. Interestingly the guy on VAR was the same one who referred the Portugal penalty back to the referee the other night.

In other words they have fucked up something so badly they needed to make adjustments, only to fuck it up even more.

 

[bluealf]

There is no such thing as an indirect free kick for handball. Whether you’d like to think it should be handball or not isn’t really relevant to the laws of the game as they stand, which specifically describe this exact situation as an example of a non handball. I’ve posted this in another thread but will put it here aswell. It’s from the video version of the official laws of the game, with live examples.

What if the player is falling backwards on the goalline and makes a save?
It is pedantic but it could be contrived or manipulated by a clever player.

 

[flook]

You probably won’t like the answer because it revolves around the complicated subject of what constitutes a “deliberate play” of the ball. These are the words of a journalist who understands the laws of the game and the workings of VAR better than anyone else I know about:

—-

If the officials believed Talbi had made a "deliberate play," the phase is reset, Griezmann is onside and the goal counts.

If the officials believed Talbi hasn't made a "deliberate play," the phase isn't reset, Griezmann remains offside from Tchouameni's pass, and the goal is disallowed.


Essentially, a "deliberate play" is about the defender being in control of his actions. It's not purely about a player trying to kick or head a ball. If the defender has to stretch to play the ball, and can't have true influence about where it goes, that's not considered a "deliberate play."

This is a hugely subjective area of the offside law, which is why referee Matthew Conger of New Zealand had to go to the pitchside monitor to make the decision.

——-

So the answer to your question as to why it wasn’t a matter of fact decision and was handed back down to the referee to decide is that it hinged on a subjective interpretation of whether a “deliberate play” was made. Interestingly the guy on VAR was the same one who referred the Portugal penalty back to the referee the other night.

OK thats a considered and reasonable answer, not something I'm used to on here :)

I do have further questions though

Who is this journalist and on what basis do you make the statement of his competence?

Where is this definition of what constitutes a "deliberate play" set down? Over the years I've seen a number of incidences where the defenders touch has been far less controlled than the header in question here which have resulted in the goal standing. I've also heard on each of these occasions, from a number of different pundits/commentators etc, and if I'm not mistaken, the likes of Peter Walton, that if the defender has made a deliberate effort to play the ball then he has played the attacker on side. (Not that I'm suggesting for a minute that any of these are qualified to make such a statement and it be factually correct).

Assuming your definition is the correct one, how is "being in control" then defined? The defender here jumped, got his headed to the ball and directed it away from goal. That would seem to me to be a controlled action. Another example, a defender plays the ball with his foot and it goes to an opposition player, is that uncontrolled or just crap control.

Finally, why in god knows how many premier league matches has a VAR decision never been referred back to the referee? I refuse to believe that this type of incident has never happened before in a VAR controlled game, in fact as per my earlier comment, I've seen a number of such instances and VAR has always made the decision.

 

[Stephen230]

What if the player is falling backwards on the goalline and makes a save?
It is pedantic but it could be contrived or manipulated by a clever player.

Well by law a handball is a handball. Where it happens on the pitch should be irrelevant. The only exception is when a goal is scored or directly assisted by an accidentally handball. In practice, if a hand did stop the ball going in the goal, I suspect it might be judged as intentional come what may.

 

[Stephen230]

OK thats a considered and reasonable answer, not something I'm used to on here :)

I do have further questions though

Who is this journalist and on what basis do you make the statement of his competence?

Where is this definition of what constitutes a "deliberate play" set down? Over the years I've seen a number of incidences where the defenders touch has been far less controlled than the header in question here which have resulted in the goal standing. I've also heard on each of these occasions, from a number of different pundits/commentators etc, and if I'm not mistaken, the likes of Peter Walton, that if the defender has made a deliberate effort to play the ball then he has played the attacker on side. (Not that I'm suggesting for a minute that any of these are qualified to make such a statement and it be factually correct).

Assuming your definition is the correct one, how is "being in control" then defined? The defender here jumped, got his headed to the ball and directed it away from goal. That would seem to me to be a controlled action. Another example, a defender plays the ball with his foot and it goes to an opposition player, is that uncontrolled or just crap control.

Finally, why in god knows how many premier league matches has a VAR decision never been referred back to the referee? I refuse to believe that this type of incident has never happened before in a VAR controlled game, in fact as per my earlier comment, I've seen a number of such instances and VAR has always made the decision.

The journalist is called Dale Johnson, editor at ESPN football. I trust his competence because whenever anybody on Twitter challenges his knowledge of the laws of the game he nearly always replies with evidence he was right. He is reviewing every single VAR intervention during the World Cup. And when the Premier League is running he has a weekly article on a Monday, reviewing the weekends controversies. I prefer his take to ex referees like Gallagher on Sky, who always seems to find an excuse to claim the right decision was made, as he’s not afraid to call out an error when that’s his opinion.

This takes some digesting but the official definition of “deliberate play”

As an aside, the French FA have complained to FIFA that Tunisia kicked off after the “goal” before it was disallowed. Which obviously shouldn’t happen. I didn’t watch it live but shouldn’t be hard to prove either way.

 

[Stephen230]

Farcical scenes at the end of the France, Tunisia game which I’ve only just caught up with. It seems the referee blew for Tunisia to kick off and then in the next breath immediately blew for full time. That would make a VAR review out of the question. Either way it’s a fuck up in communication because if he was aware a VAR review was impending he shouldn’t have blown for either a restart or full time. I reckon he will probably claim he was just blowing for full time and not a restart.

France are apparently confident that FIFA will adjust the final score to 1-1 after a hearing in the morning. That’s highly unlikely though, as the laws of the game specifically state that a match result will not be invalidated in the case of incorrect use of VAR protocol. Either way, don’t expect to see any of the officials involved again in the tournament.

Thank Christ it doesn’t actually make any difference to the group standings, or they’d be some shit going down.

 

[stonerblue]

Colour me confused, no wait, colour me absolutely fucking baffled

VAR was sold to the masses on the basis it was there to correct "clear and obvious errors".
Post introduction, this was amended to "clear and obvious errors except for offside which is factual and not open to interpretation"
After todays 98th minute debacle in the Tunisia v France game, I'm once again confused as to what the remit of VAR is with regards offside.
If VAR decided it's offside, then why is the referee asked to review the decision on the telly? By their own rules of implementation it is either offside or it's not.

I was a VAR fan originally, I thought it would reduce the "variation" in decisions we see week in and week out. Instead it has created far more controversy than it has resolved, and today i finally moved into the fuck it off camp

And 3 hours after your post things got worse..

 

[Corky]

The fact is none have been given by VAR or in real time when a defender has headed the ball back to an attacker before.

Next they will start booking a player for leaving the pitch to take a throw-in, as it's in the Laws...