VAR - The Great Debate

[thevelourfog]

The issue with "clear and obvious" errors is that you need to adopt a position of knowing there was an error, knowing you could do something about the error ... but actively choosing not to. It sounds okay on paper, but it's just not workable. We can't seriously think we'd be happy know a VAR ref looked at a foul on a Chelsea player in the area but decided it wasn't that big a mistake so let it go?

I mean this as criticism of VAR, not defence. The original intention of how to use it was always a nonsense that essentially replicated the problem that VAR is supposed to address; that we can all see errors on camera quickly but nothing is done about them.

[martin1905]

Changing the offside rule won't help when it comes to VAR.

If it's marginal, clear daylight, thicker lines, different part of the body, whatever it will still come down to the finest of margins as there will always be two lines, one onside and one offside.

The only solution is to admit it was a mistake trying to bring it in and  get rid of it altogether. It has completely and utterly ruined the game. 

It's fine sitting at home on the sofa watching countless replays and hearing it being discussed but it's soul destroying being there and has destroyed the match day experience.

Without trying to sound patronising if you haven't been to a game where VAR is being used you really have no idea just how bad it is.

Craziest thing is they still get so much wrong so it is utterly pointless. Football is quite simply the wrong sport for it and it doesn't work. At all. 

Edited February 9 by martin1905

[Ham]

4 hours ago, martin1905 said:

Changing the offside rule won't help when it comes to VAR.

If it's marginal, clear daylight, thicker lines, different part of the body, whatever it will still come down to the finest of margins as there will always be two lines, one onside and one offside.

The only solution is to admit it was a mistake trying to bring it in and  get rid of it altogether. It has completely and utterly ruined the game. 

It's fine sitting at home on the sofa watching countless replays and hearing it being discussed but it's soul destroying being there and has destroyed the match day experience.

Without trying to sound patronising if you haven't been to a game where VAR is being used you really have no idea just how bad it is.

Craziest thing is they still get so much wrong so it is utterly pointless. Football is quite simply the wrong sport for it and it doesn't work. At all. 

I do think that the offside rule can be easily improved by firstly making the foot the only part measured and secondly by making the line really thick. The length of a boot thick. 

If both players' feet are on the thick line, no offside.  

Edited February 9 by Ham

[chara]

@Ham....stop posting common sense Ham,,,confuses the issue!

[Dwmh]

1 hour ago, Ham said:

I do think that the offside rule can be easily improved by firstly making the foot the only part measured and secondly by making the line really thick. The length of a boot thick. 

If both players' feet are on the thick line, no offside.  

So 29 cm is onside and 31 cm is off side.   Or does the width change according to shirt colour?

[martin1905]

2 hours ago, Ham said:

I do think that the offside rule can be easily improved by firstly making the foot the only part measured and secondly by making the line really thick. The length of a boot thick. 

If both players' feet are on the thick line, no offside.  

Would still have the same issue though surely?

No matter what part of the body you use or how thick the line is it's still a line where one side of it is on and the other off.

I'm confusing myself with how most people see it like you, or similarly, yet I can't my head round why it would make any difference when VAR look at it to the nearest millimetre.

[chiswickblue]

37 minutes ago, martin1905 said:

Would still have the same issue though surely?

No matter what part of the body you use or how thick the line is it's still a line where one side of it is on and the other off.

I'm confusing myself with how most people see it like you, or similarly, yet I can't my head round why it would make any difference when VAR look at it to the nearest millimetre.

You need an "empire's call" grey zone like in cricket so you can acknowledge that there is no point is measuring things to the mm. Of course whether you are in the grey zone or not will still be measured by mm...

[Dwmh]

4 minutes ago, chiswickblue said:

You need an "empire's call" grey zone like in cricket so you can acknowledge that there is no point is measuring things to the mm. Of course whether you are in the grey zone or not will still be measured by mm...

That already works for Red cards and obviously wrong decisions.  Big success IMO (and play has already been stopped).
It doesn't work for offside.
For offside the lino doesn't make an Umpire Call.  He is forbidden to call it offside or not.

True he may wave his flag after the event is over, but nobody takes that seriously.  In reality their is only the VAR decision on offside.

[Ham]

46 minutes ago, martin1905 said:

Would still have the same issue though surely?

No matter what part of the body you use or how thick the line is it's still a line where one side of it is on and the other off.

I'm confusing myself with how most people see it like you, or similarly, yet I can't my head round why it would make any difference when VAR look at it to the nearest millimetre.

It'll be far more objective than trying to measure toenail against shirtsleeve and it'll be easier to gauge daylight between the boots. It's far more difficult when they're overlaid. 

[Sciatika]

Maybe we should simply say that if a decision is so marginal that it requires the use of ultra-high-speed video to determine whether it should be given or not, then it should be given. Maybe our problem is about expectations. If we simply say we don't mind in-game if it is wrong or not, the benefit of the doubt should be given to the attacker. Maybe we actually care about fairness much more than correctness. So, for instance, maybe the fan would be better served by comprehensive checking post-match (with full transparency) and keeping publicly accessible tables correlating teams, personnel and mistakes so we can see who tends to get the benefits of decisions, who gives them and, if so, why. Maybe, we would find that certain officials tend to make mistakes in a particular area that could be improved by training. Maybe, we find that mistakes are made in favour of teams at home, and we can consider what can be done. Or maybe we find that particular teams benefit from marginal calls because they attack more (remember, we give attackers the benefit of the doubt). Or maybe we discover favouritism unintentional or not, or even corrupt practice. Maybe being correct is unnecessary.

Edited February 10 by Sciatika

[RDCW]

5 hours ago, Sciatika said:

Maybe we should simply say that if a decision is so marginal that it requires the use of ultra-high-speed video to determine whether it should be given or not, then it should be given. Maybe our problem is about expectations. If we simply say we don't mind in-game if it is wrong or not, the benefit of the doubt should be given to the attacker. Maybe we actually care about fairness much more than correctness. So, for instance, maybe the fan would be better served by comprehensive checking post-match (with full transparency) and keeping publicly accessible tables correlating teams, personnel and mistakes so we can see who tends to get the benefits of decisions, who gives them and, if so, why. Maybe, we would find that certain officials tend to make mistakes in a particular area that could be improved by training. Maybe, we find that mistakes are made in favour of teams at home, and we can consider what can be done. Or maybe we find that particular teams benefit from marginal calls because they attack more (remember, we give attackers the benefit of the doubt). Or maybe we discover favouritism unintentional or not, or even corrupt practice. Maybe being correct is unnecessary.

Great post. I think this encapsulates what VAR should be about. I love the idea of post match and season long statistical analysis of the decision outcomes; that alone would focus the minds of the VAR operators.

[ROTG]

12 hours ago, Ham said:

It'll be far more objective than trying to measure toenail against shirtsleeve and it'll be easier to gauge daylight between the boots. It's far more difficult when they're overlaid. 

It's was mentioned on by one of the journalists on the back pages on sky this morning,that in rugby it's the referee who asks for video assistance and they do not get involved on goals and offside decisions unless asked, they only contact the referee if they spot a high tackle or violent play. 

That's seem a far more sensible solution to keep the game moving with VAR. 

[Backbiter]

On 10/02/2024 at 19:21, ROTG said:

It's was mentioned on by one of the journalists on the back pages on sky this morning,that in rugby it's the referee who asks for video assistance and they do not get involved on goals and offside decisions unless asked, they only contact the referee if they spot a high tackle or violent play. 

That's seem a far more sensible solution to keep the game moving with VAR. 

Not true. They draw refs' attention to lots of things. In the world cup final they intervened to disallow a NZ try for a hard-to-spot knock-on at  line out. Turns out they got the protocol wrong, and they shouldn't have intervened because there were too many phases of play between the incident and the 'try'. 

[paulw66]

On 09/02/2024 at 22:55, martin1905 said:

Would still have the same issue though surely?

No matter what part of the body you use or how thick the line is it's still a line where one side of it is on and the other off.

I'm confusing myself with how most people see it like you, or similarly, yet I can't my head round why it would make any difference when VAR look at it to the nearest millimetre.

 

On 09/02/2024 at 23:44, Ham said:

It'll be far more objective than trying to measure toenail against shirtsleeve and it'll be easier to gauge daylight between the boots. It's far more difficult when they're overlaid. 

If you think about the spirit of the law of offside, touched on previously, at least if you were drawing the lines with the feet (boots) there is some logic to that. If a player is played clean through from 40 yards away from goal, the only thing that gives any advantage is where his feet are, as he needs to run, and then kick the ball (both actions requiring feet!).

The Lukaku "goal" in the LC final was an obvious one which highlights the current absurdities of the law. His shoulder, was it, was determined marginally ahead of VVD's boot, yet he then ran through (with his feet), and then kicked the ball into the goal (with his feet) 

 

Going back to the rugby argument. They have VAR, but they never use it to work out if a player is inches offside. Example, a fly half kicks the ball over the top, and for those who don't know the laws, if another players wants to chase after that ball, he needs to be behind the kicker at point of kicking. If another player sprints after the ball, gets it and scores, they wouldn't overall rule it if his knee cap had been an inch ahead of the kicker. 

Edited February 12 by paulw66

[paulw66]

Also, easier to draw lines from the boots. When a player is leaning forward, you currently don't know / cant tell what body part is the most advanced.......sometimes you see the freezeframe and you have no idea from what body part they will draw the lines. 

There was an example of Brighton v Liverpool a couple of years back, where pure logic dictates they drew the lines from the wrong part of the Brighton player's body

And the other main thing with disallowing a goal because of an inch or two is the precision of the technology. Quite often at point of freezeframe, you can see a gap between foot and ball. They are using imprecise tech to judge something very precise. 

[ROTG]

5 hours ago, paulw66 said:

Also, easier to draw lines from the boots. When a player is leaning forward, you currently don't know / cant tell what body part is the most advanced

Agree leaning forward to measure something should be kept to 100m /  200m sprint races in athletics 

[flllerywhereru2]

Another example of non intervention of VAR last night which is as much of an issue as intervention. Since when can you put two hands on an opponents shoulders in the box and stop them from jumping. We must be getting close to double figures with not given penalties/not even looked at this season.

[Ham]

22 minutes ago, flllerywhereru2 said:

Another example of non intervention of VAR last night which is as much of an issue as intervention. Since when can you put two hands on an opponents shoulders in the box and stop them from jumping. We must be getting close to double figures with not given penalties/not even looked at this season.

On his shoulders and around his neck. It was as clear as day, as was the foul on Caicedo for their goal. 

As far as I know, VAR didn't look at either. 

[paulw66]

5 minutes ago, Ham said:

On his shoulders and around his neck. It was as clear as day, as was the foul on Caicedo for their goal. 

As far as I know, VAR didn't look at either. 

Popularity contest. Never going to punish poor little palace against big spending Chelsea.

15 fouls by Palace, 1 yellow (there was a second but that was for dissent)

[flllerywhereru2]

2 hours ago, paulw66 said:

Popularity contest. Never going to punish poor little palace against big spending Chelsea.

15 fouls by Palace, 1 yellow (there was a second but that was for dissent)

Probably spot on there.....last nights episode of the sports soap opera with it's VAR director called for plucky palace to grab a point so that the talking heads in the studio could talk about how much money the Chelsea project had wasted and demoralise them in time for their new show at the weekend....luckily Chelsea were not reading the script...this time...

[Ham]

2 hours ago, flllerywhereru2 said:

Probably spot on there.....last nights episode of the sports soap opera with it's VAR director called for plucky palace to grab a point so that the talking heads in the studio could talk about how much money the Chelsea project had wasted and demoralise them in time for their new show at the weekend....luckily Chelsea were not reading the script...this time...

Gary Neville was setting the tone for post match punditry during the first half. VAR were doing their bit to assist.

Chelsea didn't read the script.

[Mark Kelly]

1 minute ago, Ham said:

Gary Neville was setting the tone for post match punditry during the first half. VAR were doing their bit to assist.

Chelsea didn't read the script.

It's not just me then ...

There was a bit of commentary when it was 1-1 where the commentator said something along the lines of "the ninety minutes are almost up and there can't be much added on time for Palace to hang on for" followed almost immediately we scored the winner with " there should be a fair bit of added time for Palace to get back into the game" I'm paraphrasing but that was the gist.

Edited February 13 by Mark Kelly

[chara]

1 hour ago, Mark Kelly said:

It's not just me then ...

There was a bit of commentary when it was 1-1 where the commentator said something along the lines of "the ninety minutes are almost up and there can't be much added on time for Palace to hang on for" followed almost immediately we scored the winner with " there should be a fair bit of added time for Palace to get back into the game" I'm paraphrasing but that was the gist.

Yeah something that crossed my mind was the added time,,,,, or not added....4 minutes?..... seemed to favour Palace with the point held on to....Unfortunately Conor spoilt that then Enzo rubbed it in.

The quiet elephant on the pitch as ever was the question of the added time,,seems even more puzzling than the VAR travesties!,,,will never happen but a score board with added time as assessed shown during the game would clear up a lot of bewilderment,,10 minutes some games and a bare minimum others,,,very rarely does added not go over the posted figure,,,, How long did the Silva injury hold up the game?

Just asking.

[Dwmh]

7 hours ago, flllerywhereru2 said:

Another example of non intervention of VAR last night which is as much of an issue as intervention. Since when can you put two hands on an opponents shoulders in the box and stop them from jumping. We must be getting close to double figures with not given penalties/not even looked at this season.

We have been given more penalties than any other club in the prem.
https://www.transfermarkt.co.uk/premier-league/topErhalteneElfmeter/wettbewerb/GB1

If we are moaning I can only imagine what other fora are saying.

[Mark Kelly]

Just now, Dwmh said:

We have been given more penalties than any other club in the prem.
https://www.transfermarkt.co.uk/premier-league/topErhalteneElfmeter/wettbewerb/GB1

If we are moaning I can only imagine what other fora are saying.

It's not a question of the ones we've been awarded 

it's the one's we haven't been awarded that are the issue.

Maybe we should have three times as many penalties than we actually have. 

I'm sure the others aren't moaning if every time they should get a penalty they do get a penalty