The Video Assistant Referee (VAR)

[Stevo985]

12 minutes ago, sne said:

Ah Ok.

I think it's down to it being imperfect, expensive, and mainly because FIFA/UEFA are huge slow organizations who doesn't like to do things unless they get paid to do it.

edit: when the NFL decided to go VAR it was a commissioner and a few crazy rich owners who said OK, much smoother decision process.

Football is heavier work, but it wont be long before football is the same with a few crazy rich clubs making the rules and perhaps before long creating their own league.

It's definitely imperfect, but again I don't think that's an argument to not have something. Having linesmen isn't perfect, having goalline officials isn't perfect. But you introduce these things because it gets you closer to perfect.

I do understand the expense argument. And there are people who say if you can't introduce it throughout every level of football then you shouldn't have it. But again that doesn't make sense. Sunday League teams can't afford to have linesmen but it's no reason to not have them at the top level.

 

It is different to other sports, but it's clearly achievable. I always feel like the powers that be in football are always reluctant to make big rule changes. And when they do they're crap at enforcing them. Other sports' governing bodies just seem to say "this is what we're doing, get used to it"

It's more complicated than that, but ultimately I can't see VAR being a bad thing. In 5 years I don't think there will be many people saying we shouldn't have it.

[bannedfromHandV]

The penalty awarded to Fulham on the weekend was a joke and if VAR is going to award a penalty every time there is the slightest of contacts then we're only going to see an increase in diving and players falling over easily - which in my opinion is the true scourge of the game right now and has been for some time, far more so than the odd incorrect offside call. 

So for me, VAR stands to further damage the sport as much as its likely to help it. 

I would accept VAR if used only to determine definite things, was the player offside (provided the right camera angle is available), did the ball cross the line etc. 

Using it to evaluate potential penalties is a joke as everyone will have their own view on it, it's often very much not a definitive thing. 

[Stevo985]

1 hour ago, bannedfromHandV said:

The penalty awarded to Fulham on the weekend was a joke and if VAR is going to award a penalty every time there is the slightest of contacts then we're only going to see an increase in diving and players falling over easily - which in my opinion is the true scourge of the game right now and has been for some time, far more so than the odd incorrect offside call. 

So for me, VAR stands to further damage the sport as much as its likely to help it. 

I would accept VAR if used only to determine definite things, was the player offside (provided the right camera angle is available), did the ball cross the line etc. 

Using it to evaluate potential penalties is a joke as everyone will have their own view on it, it's often very much not a definitive thing. 

There's no way VAR is going to increase diving.

I do think there is a problem at the moment with referees feeling pressured to reverse decisions if VAR is used. I think that was a problem at the world cup too. So if VAR is saying there might have been a penalty the ref feels pressured to give it. That has to change for sure.

But again I think that's a problem with implementation rather than the actual technology.

 

The lack of a penalty being definitive is a total non-issue. VAR gives the referee another, better, chance to make a decision. That can only be a good thing. That ref can still make a mistake or interpret something differently to a different ref and get a decision wrong, but that's not an argument against using the technology, imo.

It's the seatbelt analogy again.

Edited January 10, 2019 by Stevo985

[bannedfromHandV]

29 minutes ago, Stevo985 said:

There's no way VAR is going to increase diving.

I do think there is a problem at the moment with referees feeling pressured to reverse decisions if VAR is used. I think that was a problem at the world cup too. So if VAR is saying there might have been a penalty the ref feels pressured to give it. That has to change for sure.

But again I think that's a problem with implementation rather than the actual technology.

 

The lack of a penalty being definitive is a total non-issue. VAR gives the referee another, better, chance to make a decision. That can only be a good thing. That ref can still make a mistake or interpret something differently to a different ref and get a decision wrong, but that's not an argument against using the technology, imo.

It's the seatbelt analogy again.

But if the criteria for giving a penalty is simply any contact whatsoever then is that not red rag to a bull for players to start/carry on falling over at every given opportunity?

In terms of diving - I guess it depends on your definition, diving for me isn't simply when there is no contact, if you send yourself to the ground irrespective of contact or not, that's diving in my book.

Then there's the issue with the flow of what is a highly fluid sport, as Sarri said, once the linesman's flag went up the other night players stopped - you can argue that they should play to the whistle but a lino's flag going up has, until now, been as good as the whistle going essentially.

I know you're a big advocate for this Steve and I think you know that I'm not, there isn't much middle ground I guess but I see this changing the sport irrevocably and I'm concerned that it's not for the better in terms of the core enjoyment of the game. Sure, we may see less incorrect decisions, and if your main priority is to remove those mistakes then yes, VAR is for you. But if your primary concern is enjoyment of the sport and spectacle, I'm just not sure this fits.

[Stevo985]

17 minutes ago, bannedfromHandV said:

But if the criteria for giving a penalty is simply any contact whatsoever then is that not red rag to a bull for players to start/carry on falling over at every given opportunity?

In terms of diving - I guess it depends on your definition, diving for me isn't simply when there is no contact, if you send yourself to the ground irrespective of contact or not, that's diving in my book.

But that's not the criteria for a penalty. And is that's what's happening then that definitely needs to be addressed. That's not a VAR problem, that's an interpretation of the rules problem.
VAR giving referees a second chance to view an incident from multiple angles can only be a good thing for diving. It gives them more opportunity to spot it.

17 minutes ago, bannedfromHandV said:

 

Then there's the issue with the flow of what is a highly fluid sport, as Sarri said, once the linesman's flag went up the other night players stopped - you can argue that they should play to the whistle but a lino's flag going up has, until now, been as good as the whistle going essentially.

Analysis has shown that stoppages for VAR are far far less than stoppages for multiple other factors. In the World Cup VAR averaged 30 seconds of stoppage per game.

Substitutions caused 3 minutes of stoppages. Waiting for free kicks to be taken caused an average of 10 and a half minutes of stoppages! 

Relatively speaking, VAR is way down the list (it was 11th on the list of things that cause the most stoppages)

17 minutes ago, bannedfromHandV said:

I know you're a big advocate for this Steve and I think you know that I'm not, there isn't much middle ground I guess but I see this changing the sport irrevocably and I'm concerned that it's not for the better in terms of the core enjoyment of the game. Sure, we may see less incorrect decisions, and if your main priority is to remove those mistakes then yes, VAR is for you. But if your primary concern is enjoyment of the sport and spectacle, I'm just not sure this fits.

I just don't see how it takes away from the enjoyment of the game. Honest question. I don't see it. Because every now and then you have to wait a minute for a decision to be reviewed?

I don't buy it. I think most of the problem these days is a fear of change. I don't see a reason other than "it's different and I don't like it". Like I said in 5 years people will barely notice, and I'd wager football won't be any less enjoyable than it was before, and we'll get a lot more correct decisions as a result.

Edited January 10, 2019 by Stevo985

[bannedfromHandV]

17 minutes ago, Stevo985 said:

But that's not the criteria for a penalty. And is that's what's happening then that definitely needs to be addressed. That's not a VAR problem, that's an interpretation of the rules problem.
VAR giving referees a second chance to view an incident from multiple angles can only be a good thing for diving. It gives them more opportunity to spot it.

Analysis has shown that stoppages for VAR are far far less than stoppages for multiple other factors. In the World Cup VAR averaged 30 seconds of stoppage per game.

Substitutions caused 3 minutes of stoppages. Waiting for free kicks to be taken caused an average of 10 and a half minutes of stoppages! 

Relatively speaking, VAR is way down the list (it was 11th on the list of things that cause the most stoppages)

I just don't see how it takes away from the enjoyment of the game. Honest question. I don't see it. Because every now and then you have to wait a minute for a decision to be reviewed?

I don't buy it. I think most of the problem these days is a fear of change. I don't see a reason other than "it's different and I don't like it". Like I said in 5 years people will barely notice, and I'd wager football won't be any less enjoyable than it was before, and we'll get a lot more correct decisions as a result.

Did you see the penalty fulham were given on the weekend? Defender just about scraped the top of Cairney's boot, he went down like he'd been shot and on review a penalty was given, it was not a penalty in a month of Sundays for me. That they missed the penalty is inconsequential. 

Those delays you reference are already there and will never likely go away so its a bit of a non event to say that VAR takes up less time than free kicks etc as the VAR review time will only add to the delays, it won't replace or reduce any. 

 

[Stevo985]

1 hour ago, bannedfromHandV said:

Did you see the penalty fulham were given on the weekend? Defender just about scraped the top of Cairney's boot, he went down like he'd been shot and on review a penalty was given, it was not a penalty in a month of Sundays for me. That they missed the penalty is inconsequential. 

I didn't, but again if it's as you described then it's the ref's fault for giving it. VAR hasn't magically made that a penalty. It's given the ref a better chance to view an incident. If he's made a wrong decision off the back of it then that's his fault, not VAR's fault. Like I said if ref's are feeling pressured into giving penalties because they've been asked to review a decision then that absolutely is a problem and needs to be fixed. But that fix isn't to take VAR away. That's throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

1 hour ago, bannedfromHandV said:

Those delays you reference are already there and will never likely go away so its a bit of a non event to say that VAR takes up less time than free kicks etc as the VAR review time will only add to the delays, it won't replace or reduce any. 

 

But they can go away. The new proposed rules about substitutes will save way more time than VAR will add for example. Similarly the time taken over free kicks is genuinely ludicrous. That could easily be tackled.

I don't think an average of 30 seconds per game, when the ball is out of play for 30-40 odd minutes per game anyway matters much in the grand scheme of things. I genuinely don't believe that someone's enjoyment of a game is going to be ruined because they had to wait for a minute for a penalty to be given.

[Zatman]

Valladolid scored tonight and took good old VAR 5 minutes to disallow the goal.

[Zatman]

Last week Levante had a dodgy VAR call against them vs Atletico. Maybe they add up

[TrentVilla]

5 minutes ago, Zatman said:

Last week Levante had a dodgy VAR call against them vs Atletico. Maybe they add up

Even out over a season apparently...

[bannedfromHandV]

18 hours ago, Zatman said:

Valladolid scored tonight and took good old VAR 5 minutes to disallow the goal.

That's 5 minutes of the game gone.

They have to consider stopping the clock (a la rugby) for VAR reviews.......

[Zatman]

58 minutes ago, bannedfromHandV said:

That's 5 minutes of the game gone.

They have to consider stopping the clock (a la rugby) for VAR reviews.......

Was a comical 6 minutes added on at the end of game 

[bannedfromHandV]

1 hour ago, Zatman said:

Was a comical 6 minutes added on at the end of game 

But you get 3 mins added on as standard, additional time for injuries/subs etc.......I doubt whether anything more than a minute was reclaimed out of the 5 that went missing.....

[sne]

Still only a yellow card after VAR review?

Tackle looks even worse in the video, refs making the calls are still going to be as biased for or against teams and players.

[sne]

One of those new football situations we'll have to get used to in the Serie A over the weekend.

Fiorentina calling for a penalty and while they are crowding the ref Spal scores a goal on the counter.

and then the ref is alerted by the VAR team and ends up gifting Fiorentina a penalty and thus cancelling the Spal goal.

The penalty? It was extremely soft with Chiesa making a meal out of it with a dive, but Veretout scored and Fiorentina went on to win 4-1

So VAR or no VAR the bigger teams will continue to get the calls they need. Like they've always get.

[villa4europe]

Still given after VAR

cant stop the ineptitude

[Stevo985]

Handballs on VAR seem to be a real problem as well. Everything looks like a handball in slow motion. It's resulting in some crap decisions. That's something that definitely needs to be looked at.

I'm very pro VAR but there's clearly some issues that need ironing out.

[Zatman]

Aguero probably should have had his goal allowed

[villa4europe]

1 hour ago, Stevo985 said:

Handballs on VAR seem to be a real problem as well. Everything looks like a handball in slow motion. It's resulting in some crap decisions. That's something that definitely needs to be looked at.

I'm very pro VAR but there's clearly some issues that need ironing out.

i think the world cup changed my opinion on VAR but most of its use since seems to be reaffirming what i thought of it originally, you can give someone who doesnt know what they're doing all the tools in the world and they still wont know what they are doing

we still need better refs

[Zatman]

29 minutes ago, villa4europe said:

i think the world cup changed my opinion on VAR but most of its use since seems to be reaffirming what i thought of it originally, you can give someone who doesnt know what they're doing all the tools in the world and they still wont know what they are doing

we still need better refs

Fifa got it spot on at World Cup. A rarity i know. Everybody else seems to balls it up