VAR

[Sexual Ealing]

Teen Wolf 2? Police Academy 9? The Piano? Anne of Green Gables? Turner & Hooch? Drop Dead Fred? The Bride Wore Black? Slutty Housewives of Rotherham?

[Baldy]

Teen Wolf 2? Police Academy 9? The Piano? Anne of Green Gables? Turner & Hooch? Drop Dead Fred? The Bride Wore Black? Slutty Housewives of Rotherham?

Good try.

I was in Slutty Housewives of Rotherham. Played Maggies left tit.

But wrong. The correct answer is Criminal Law (Kevin Bacon, Gary Oldman). I thought it was a great but most people thought it was shit. Bit like VAR.

[RamboandBruno]

I was old bloke moaning about VAR ruining the game and hopefully it will go. My 14 year old lad, just looked at me and said VAR is essential to how we play.

Wise words and all that.

Terminator

[Whiney MacWhineface]

Lines(wo)men were pretty well accurate, so, as suggested above and works well in cricket, have lino's call defined, that way the lino can raise a flag as they used to. Var can check quickly because they're not fussing about whether a line scraped over a toenail or armpit hair.

[chrisw1]

Lines(wo)men were pretty well accurate, so, as suggested above and works well in cricket, have lino's call defined, that way the lino can raise a flag as they used to. Var can check quickly because they're not fussing about whether a line scraped over a toenail or armpit hair.

Why can’t we just have the right answer?  In cricket lbw they’re guessing out of necessity.  In football offsides we have the technology to give a factual decision (if they use the ball sensor to) or as close to it as we could possibly hope.  That seems like a better answer to me.


If people are worried about toenails they could build in a margin of tolerance, but there always a line where that last mm will count, whether it is the actual line or the adjusted tolerance line, so I don’t see much point in having anything other than the correct answer.

[Toronto Villa]

To me a player can be in an offside position but the ref in assessing needs to determine if it creates a clear and obvious advantage. Or if it made a clear and obvious difference to a goal being scored. So many VAR calls are for the most marginal examples (see Coventry goal in FA Cup SF that was ruled out). If they can get rid of that VAR becomes a more useful resource. Same with handballs. Common sense can determine intent. Some of the incidental handballs resulting in penalties are ludicrous.

[chrisw1]

Well yes, refs will still have to make the judgment calls.  But the fact of a player being in an offside position or not should be sorted almost instantly by the semi-automated system.  It’s obviously down to the ref / VAR to decide what to do with that info

[Somniloquism]

To me a player can be in an offside position but the ref in assessing needs to determine if it creates a clear and obvious advantage. Or if it made a clear and obvious difference to a goal being scored. So many VAR calls are for the most marginal examples (see Coventry goal in FA Cup SF that was ruled out). If they can get rid of that VAR becomes a more useful resource. Same with handballs. Common sense can determine intent. Some of the incidental handballs resulting in penalties are ludicrous.

I'm not sure on your argument in the first few. Yes, being in the position doesn't mean offside, but if a player touches the ball then they are offside. It is a definitive. If you are stating the Cov player didn't mean to be offside by a toe so the goal should be given, then where do you set the line. Bailey didn't mean to be offside for our goal on Monday for example, and whilst not being as close as the Cov call, it was a lot closer then it looked on the field. And when it does become subjective for the offside player (in the view of the keeper, touched a defender first), then the onfield ref does have final say. No subjective calls are really made by VAR apart from "does that tally with what the on-field ref just told me".

As for handball, under current rulings, (which are being reviewed), the only definitive is did the scorer handball it before scoring? As there is no accidental handball side to that, VAR can be definitive. Anything else is subjective and in the PL at least, VAR has barely given a defensive handball penalty in the second half of the season, it is normally the on-field decision.

[The Edge]

Lines(wo)men were pretty well accurate, so, as suggested above and works well in cricket, have lino's call defined, that way the lino can raise a flag as they used to. Var can check quickly because they're not fussing about whether a line scraped over a toenail or armpit hair.

Why can’t we just have the right answer?  In cricket lbw they’re guessing out of necessity.  In football offsides we have the technology to give a factual decision (if they use the ball sensor to) or as close to it as we could possibly hope.  That seems like a better answer to me.


If people are worried about toenails they could build in a margin of tolerance, but there always a line where that last mm will count, whether it is the actual line or the adjusted tolerance line, so I don’t see much point in having anything other than the correct answer.

For an offside decision to be factual you need to determine the exact moment when the ball is released by the passing player. They've been guessing since the introduction of var because every time they draw those lines on the screen they show an image of the player making the pass and invariably the image is blurred. So there's room for "interpretation" by moving the image one frame forward or one frame back. We are talking milliseconds here but it makes all the difference to whether a player is on or off and it's down to them at Stockley Park to decide which frame to use. If the technology can be made accurate enough to pinpoint which is the correct frame to use it can be called "factual" but until then it's still guesswork at best.

[chrisw1]

It may be guesswork, but they’re typically looking at 3 frames and pick the one that’s looks most correct.  So it’s as educated a ‘guess’ as you can get and infinitely more accurate than a linesman’s naked eye guess when he’s watching 3-4 players at once.

With that said, it would seem ridiculous not to use the ball chip if they are implementing the rest o the semi-automated system.

[lovejoy]

So yesterday West Ham got a second goal late on when one of their players handed the ball in to the net. The ref gave the goal but it was clearly disallowed by VAR. With no VAR thats given and who knows West Ham equalise and Arsenal win the league off a refereeing howler.
Be careful what you wish for and yes I get that City losing would be funny but its only funny it it doesn't happen to your team.

[jwarry]

Staying for 24/25 apparently

[Gareth]

If you are Webb and his merry band of incompetents at PGMOL you are loving the debate about whether VAR should be abolished or not…yet again the focus is not on the actual issue which is the users / operators.

In terms of tech the moment we have a chip in the ball to judge the moment the ball is played to ensure the right image is judged for offsides it’ll be fine.

From my perspective I’d like to see the screens kicked out, if the VAR wants to make a decision they do and they put their name to it rather than sew the seed of doubt in refs mind so they almost always do what the VAR wants anyway.

Would also sack off slow motion replays…judge it at full speed as slow motion just changes everything

Proper comms to those in the stadium is pathetic that after how many years they haven’t addressed.

Final change would be to employ and FULLY train pure VAR officials…not other refs trying to assist their mates…it’s a role that should be independent and not as add on to the day job of being a ref.

[paul_e]

If you are Webb and his merry band of incompetents at PGMOL you are loving the debate about whether VAR should be abolished or not…yet again the focus is not on the actual issue which is the users / operators.

In terms of tech the moment we have a chip in the ball to judge the moment the ball is played to ensure the right image is judged for offsides it’ll be fine.

From my perspective I’d like to see the screens kicked out, if the VAR wants to make a decision they do and they put their name to it rather than sew the seed of doubt in refs mind so they almost always do what the VAR wants anyway.

Would also sack off slow motion replays…judge it at full speed as slow motion just changes everything

Proper comms to those in the stadium is pathetic that after how many years they haven’t addressed.

Final change would be to employ and FULLY train pure VAR officials…not other refs trying to assist their mates…it’s a role that should be independent and not as add on to the day job of being a ref.

No slo-mo/freeze frame for fouls but I'd keep them for things like handball where there is an objective element to the decision.

As I've said many times though the biggest changes that needs to come for fouls is to remove 'got the ball' from the discussion on whether it was a foul and to do something about the amount of times a defender gives a 2handed shove just as a player jumps/tries to control a pass. It's not subtle, it's not part of the game, it's just cheating that has been allowed to become normalised.

[edgysatsuma89]

I'd also love attacking players dangling their leg two foot away from the ball not to be a penalty. If they are initiating the contact then no pen. This is obviously a little subjective (like all fouls) but I think 9 times out of 10 people know when this has clearly happened.