The Inevitable VAR-pocalypse

[John Arne]

During the Australia-France game we saw a penalty shout turned down by the ref, Australia broke but a few seconds later the ball went out for a throw... the ref took this opportunity to check VAR and eventually awarded a penalty.

What happens when a penalty shout is turned down, the opposition break and score, only for the ref to award the original pen? I guess, he would have to go back a disallow the latest goal, which will cause MEYHEM. Or does he take the easy way out and refuse to go back to check it, even if the refs in the room tell him to?

[SincereTheRebel]

It is a mess. The referee shouldn't be the guy to signal for VAR. The VAR dudes should be making the decisions and then instruct the referee to call it.

Or give the players the authority to ask for VAR. If you dive, you are not going to ask for VAR.

[Pepe]

I don't love it but it is not that big of a deal either.

[Boydy]

Yeah, you lot are making a massive deal out of nothing. Calm the fuck down.

[John Arne]

Yeah, you lot are making a massive deal out of nothing. Calm the fuck down.

It's a fairly simple question, numbnuts.

[Disco]

It's fine.

[SincereTheRebel]

It needs adjusting. The referee shouldn't be going anywhere near the screen on the sideline

[bruhnaldo]

Telling you boys VAR is a clusterfuck. MLS kills me with it almost every week.

[-james-]

It's been fine so far. The commentators need to talk about it a lot less.

[Boydy]

It's a fairly simple question, numbnuts.
:happycry:

[Giggles]

No need for it.

[Spikey M]

It’s a bit shit, but so is the standard or refereeing in general, so nothing has really changed.

[Dark Soldier]

People moan about incorrect penalty decisions > bods introduce tech that can help right this > people moan about tech > head explodes

[Baz]

I was sceptical about goal line technology and it turned out to be the best thing to happen to football in recent years (before that it was the slip fiasco) so I’m gonna give VAR the benefit of the doubt.

[Shindig]

It's a much harder thing to get right. You don't want every decision to be ruled by it but you're still waiting for decisions to hinge on what's nothing more than a pub debate. Letter vs Spirit of the law stuff.

[SincereTheRebel]

Give each team a chance to request var per game. If a player/captain does not request it, just continue the game.

[Shindig]

Then it becomes tactical. In tennis, challenging is fine but, in football, incidents happen far too frequently.

[Browning]

But not big, game changing decisions that refs get wrong. I think having 2-3 challenges per team per game (with additional ones if you win them, perhaps) would work much better than the current system of "Let's bottle all the big calls, let the teams piss about with the ball for 30 seconds, then blow the whistle randomly and go consult the screen". They also need to stick with the "clear and obvious" guidelines and not overturn anything unless it's 100% nailed on.

You also couldn't implement the current system globally, because you can't have 5 men in a truck at every League 2 game every week. That said, given the referee is going off to consult a screen, I'm not sure what their purpose is anyway.

[Lewis]

You could follow the Super League system of referring it to the video referee as something (goal, penalty, whatever), rather than just passing the decision to somebody else, and then the video has to conclusively show it was a shite decision in order to overturn it. It's a shit system, but you could still follow it.

[SincereTheRebel]

Then it becomes tactical. In tennis, challenging is fine but, in football, incidents happen far too frequently.

If I'm a player and I dive or I feel the defender gets the ball, I'm not going to call for VAR. Should be limited to a small number per game or something.

[mugbull]

It's been great in this tournament. Edge cases will always exist

[Boydy]

Bilic sounds like Zizek. Half expect to break into a discussion on how terrible capitalism is.

[Browning]

It's been great in this tournament. Edge cases will always exist

It hasn't though.

Two penalty calls were wrong in the Argentina game, and neither were even reviewed.

Clattenberg has come out and said VAR should have ruled out Costa's goal, but again, it didn't. (I don't agree, but given he seems to be Mr VAR for this tournament, it's odd).

And as I said before, the pointless pissing about with the ball for 30-60 seconds after the ref has bottled a call and then he blows the whistle at a random point (allegedly because the ball was in a "neutral position") is just ridiculous.

There's been a few occasions where it has proved useful in over turning a poor decision, but there has to be a better way of implementing it. At the moment it just seems completely random. Plus fuck going to a game and having to wait 30 seconds before celebrating any goal because "VAR is checking for offside" every single time.

I definitely think the concept can work, but the way it's being used is not the way.

[Adramelch]

If I'm a player and I dive or I feel the defender gets the ball, I'm not going to call for VAR. Should be limited to a small number per game or something.

Yeah but you get the odd game where you haven't needed to use it and you're at the 80th minute, leading 1-0 and you use it just to disrupt play and slow down the tempo.

[niko_cee]

Something happened in the first half of the Croatia game which made me wonder as to whether there is a quite large, hidden consequence of VAR and the interpretation being applied to offside. Fine, officials have been told to err on the side of caution with marginal calls and if it leads to a goal, it can be checked. But what about where it doesn't lead to a goal? What about where it leads to a corner? Does that get reviewed? It doesn't seem beyond the realms of possibility that you could have a player played through, marginally offside, gets challenged and the ball goes out for a corner, goal from the corner. It shouldn't be a corner because it should have been a freekick, where does the VAR kick in? I would be interested to see the stats on offsides in the tournament and whether they are massively down, because, as I understand the way it is being interpreted, it is a more of a situational thing (ie if there is a goal) than an actual rule now.

[mugbull]

Nobody's gonna wait to celebrate a goal, they'll do exactly what they always do and then the ref might tell them it's been disallowed a minute later. The only difference between VAR disallowing a goal and a ref disallowing a goal is that, you know, one of them gets to see replays of the incident and the other doesn't.

VAR is in the very worst case as bad as the referee who's refereeing the game, and in the very best case much better, so having VAR really can't ever be worse than not having VAR

[Gray Fox]

The problem is there's time pressure. We saw in our domestic cups last season, they got the decisions right, but it took a while with no communication.

Now the refs have maybe 10-15 seconds to ask the VAR, then them to look at it through one of their many camera angles, then communicate their findings back to the ref.

I believe the current rule states the decision cannot be further looked at after play restarts too. Just let them take the time they need, or bring in a challenge system.

[Boom-Boom-18]

One thing that has been a big success is goal line technology. Does not impact the game at all (in terms of delays) and seems to get the decision spot on every single time.

[Foe]

Something happened in the first half of the Croatia game which made me wonder as to whether there is a quite large, hidden consequence of VAR and the interpretation being applied to offside. Fine, officials have been told to err on the side of caution with marginal calls and if it leads to a goal, it can be checked. But what about where it doesn't lead to a goal? What about where it leads to a corner? Does that get reviewed? It doesn't seem beyond the realms of possibility that you could have a player played through, marginally offside, gets challenged and the ball goes out for a corner, goal from the corner. It shouldn't be a corner because it should have been a freekick, where does the VAR kick in? I would be interested to see the stats on offsides in the tournament and whether they are massively down, because, as I understand the way it is being interpreted, it is a more of a situational thing (ie if there is a goal) than an actual rule now.

Yeah, I wondered that to. Croatia would've been better off conceding in that instance because then they'd have actually got the ball back. It needs to be do your best and call it as you see it. Advantage to the attacker and "only call it is you are 100%" are completely different. Clattenburg was basically saying he thinks refs should rely on VAR when it's active, which to me is completely wrong. You're the ref. Call the game within the laws. If you make a clear and obvious error VAR is there to save you.

[Browning]

Yeah, I wondered that to. Croatia would've been better off conceding in that instance because then they'd have actually got the ball back. It needs to be do your best and call it as you see it. Advantage to the attacker and "only call it is you are 100%" are completely different. Clattenburg was basically saying he thinks refs should rely on VAR when it's active, which to me is completely wrong. You're the ref. Call the game within the laws. If you make a clear and obvious error VAR is there to save you.

Sums up where I am too. I'm fine with it as a concept to clear up mistakes (be it via challenges, or some other method) but it shouldn't be used to bottle big calls (penalties, offsides etc) and rely on it later. It's only a matter of time before the scenario people have spoken about happens where the ref bottles a penalty and the other team go up the other end and score. Then they will have only this system to blame for the mess (by which I don't mean VAR, but the stupid way it's being implemented).

[Pepe]

Yawn.

[Spikey M]

Yeah but you get the odd game where you haven't needed to use it and you're at the 80th minute, leading 1-0 and you use it just to disrupt play and slow down the tempo.

Not only that, but most ‘dives’ aren’t DIVES(!!!). What do you do when a player goes down after minimal contact or leaves a leg to be caught. This shit gets debated every weekend of the season, how’s a geezer with a tablet and a rule book going to keep people happy?

[Shindig]

Well, let's just identify trends here. There's been a lot of penalty awards. It seems like VAR is predisposed to look more at those incidents so awards were probably likely to increase. If VAR is to continue and become part and parcel of the game, are we going to see less shenanigans in the box? Or are players just going to accept it and it leads to higher scoring games?

I think you stick with this as it could actually change how the game is played.

[Mazuuurk]

I think it seems to work really well so far? I haven't seen an instance where they've used it where the decision ends up being wrong.

[Spikey M]

I think it seems to work really well so far? I haven't seen an instance where they've used it where the decision ends up being wrong.

VAR briefly flicked up when Kane was rugby tackled to the floor according to the BBC commentary team. If they actually looked at it though, who knows.

[niko_cee]

With the first Kane one I'm certain they were looking at the wrong thing initially (the melee on the goal line which they often seem oddly obsessed with despite there being other, better tech dealing with that) and by the time the 'tackle' was being replayed too much time has elapsed.

That Australia penalty was not an obvious error by the ref. It was borderline, at best.

[Jimmy Floyd]

I thought he was right to start with and then VAR turned it wrong. Which sums up the whole problem with this: subjectivity. If the robots can't rule entirely (as on the goal line) they shouldn't be involved at all.

[Yevrah]

I thought I hadn't seen the guidelines for what situations VAR should be used in because I hadn't looked hard enough, but I wonder now if it's actually because there aren't any.

The whole thing seems so randomly applied and if that's the case, it'll ultimately end up being used for everything, which would be an absolute disaster.

[Disco]

It's like brexit, ostensibly the right thing but implemented so poorly that you wonder if it's actually worth it.

[Spikey M]

It’s not that poor.

[John Arne]

VAR :face:

1010243777498435586

[niko_cee]

Yeah, the fact that VAR seemingly is't applicable to set piece fouling rather blows a hole in my win it with set pieces theory.

[Shindig]

I'm still not sure how it works. I've seen VAR be applied to things the ref has missed and not called review for. But we've also seen bullshit like that where the guys in Moscow will be seeing the replay and going, "Well, he didn't call for review so we'll leave that." Either give the ref complete authority or none of it.

[niko_cee]

I thought the ref gets told to go and have a look at it by 'Moscow' (can't see how that is possibly going to go wrong) and then he goes and (invariably) changes his decision. It is supposed to be used for fouls in the box (ie penalties) so why it isn't on set pieces doesn't make sense.

[Shindig]

It's the part that's the most exciting to me. Imagine football where defenders are so skittish they have to mark their man without trying to halt them physically from gaining leverage. It has the potential to impact the defensive arts.

[Browning]

I think the problem with the incident last night was the ref waved it away and restarted the game within seconds. VAR didn’t have a chance.

[Pepe]

I think the biggest issue is that commentators have no clue and they confuse people even further by making shit up.