VAR Thoughts?

[Bernard Diomede]

One for the shitness of modern football thread this. Felt like an absolute farce in the ground yesterday. I'd take the odd wrong decision over that shite any day of the week.

[Baltar]

It made yesterday's game the strangest I've ever seen. It got the decisions right ultimately but fuck me it doesn't half cause uncertainty and grief even after scoring perfectly valid goals. I would stick with it since it's new and hope it'll get better. It would be silly not to use technology to help officials make the correct decisions, it just needs to be improved.

[Moo]

 

As someone sitting there at the ground wondering what the fuck was going on, it would be nice if information was displayed about what the fuck was happening. If only there was some kind of display hardware around the pitch, albeit currently only on three sides.

Exactly. Such a simple solution and would keep the tension high while the crowd waits for a decision to be confirmed.

I'm not convinced the powers that be want VAR to be a success as simple things like that could have easily been arranged before starting to use it but no, instead they seem to have made it as problematic as possible.

[INTORRESTING]

Why was it used so many times? It seems like it was used for some basic decisions as well as the big ones?

 

So you cant celebrate a goal anymore without it being looked at first. Shite

[dockers_strike]

Got to remember it is still experimental. It seems the FA are using it different to Germany and Italy. Their games they have a couple of monitors pitch side for the ref to go to. I think the ref in Germany and Italy can ask for VAR whereas last night it seemed the VAR was telling the ref there was a dubious decision. Also noticed in the Bundesliga and Serie A the ref makes an immediate VAR sign to tell the crowd whats going on. Last night the ref did not make the sign until VAR decision had been made. Saw a ref on tv say the average time from awarding a pen to kick off was two and a half minutes. I think that is bullshit and last night for Salahs pen they took an age to decide it was which was near 3 minutes before Bobby even took the pen. They need to cut down the seemingly wasted time. Lots of people will not like VAR but it has to be said every important VAR decision in last nights game was correct. It looked like the west brom ruled out goal was going to stand and Salah was not being given a pen.

[INTORRESTING]

Interesting, cheers for the background. Always problems with something new and change is always hard.

[VladimirIlyich]

Its shite. Takes too long and the referees and assistants will tend to defer to it because they are so poor at officiating. Its like those decisions in Cricket(slow) or Rugby(natural breaks between tries etc) but doesn't suit football. Absolutely ridiculous that it was used at our game but not Cardiff v Man City though.

[Trumo]

Its shite. Takes too long and the referees and assistants will tend to defer to it because they are so poor at officiating. Its like those decisions in Cricket(slow) or Rugby(natural breaks between tries etc) but doesn't suit football. Absolutely ridiculous that it was used at our game but not Cardiff v Man City though.

 

That's been my biggest bugbear with it so far. Using it in some games and not others only adds to the inconsistency. It is still experimental of course, but it would have been better to use it for every FA Cup game from the 3rd round onwards, or maybe the EFL could have chosen to trial it at every Championship fixture this season. Whatever option is chosen, it needs to be applied consistently. The more it is used, the more problems can be identified and solutions implemented.

[VladimirIlyich]

That's been my biggest bugbear with it so far. Using it in some games and not others only adds to the inconsistency. It is still experimental of course, but it would have been better to use it for every FA Cup game from the 3rd round onwards, or maybe the EFL could have chosen to trial it at every Championship fixture this season. Whatever option is chosen, it needs to be applied consistently. The more it is used, the more problems can be identified and solutions implemented.

Hard to disagree with that opinion. Using it in isolation just skews opinions and results even more. Goal line technology was used in whole tournaments rather than just the odd game and rightly so.

[thegreatelephant]

bunch of VARSE

[dockers_strike]

I do not know how anyone can say a system that got all the major decisions in a game right is shite. Yes, the FA have made an abortion of its introduction and yes the decisions have taken too long. But that is not the fault of VAR. It is the brainless dingbats that have placed these limitations on it. Take Salahs pen as an incident. Are people really telling us that the VAR and match official had to take so long to make a decision. If the VAR official cannot make a decision quickly seeing that replay as the tv audience did something is clearly wrong. Mind Andre Mariner was the VAR so I guess that explains it. They need to get out of the mindset they are undermining the match ref by giving the decision. What seemed to happen is the VAR official said I think there is an incident we need to review instead of saying the right call here is a pen.

[Bob]

I do not know how anyone can say a system that got all the major decisions in a game right is shite. Yes, the FA have made an abortion of its introduction and yes the decisions have taken too long. But that is not the fault of VAR. It is the brainless dingbats that have placed these limitations on it. Take Salahs pen as an incident. Are people really telling us that the VAR and match official had to take so long to make a decision. If the VAR official cannot make a decision quickly seeing that replay as the tv audience did something is clearly wrong. Mind Andre Mariner was the VAR so I guess that explains it. They need to get out of the mindset they are undermining the match ref by giving the decision. What seemed to happen is the VAR official said I think there is an incident we need to review instead of saying the right call here is a pen.

So once VAR comes in we’ll finally get to the point where every short pull at a corner is given as either a pen or a free kick to the defending team, will we?

 

We should of VAR is there to catch every foul.

 

Or will they choose not to bother with those ones?

 

It’s not shite because it got the decisions right, it’s shite because it’s shite and spoils the game.

 

Incidentally, I don’t think there’s a hope

In hell that Salah’s getting onto that cross with or without the pull, so while I think it was the right decision it could be argued that it wasn’t. Which is my major issue with it being used for what will always be subjective calls.

[No2]

Its farcical with it's current set up. The fact its in play for some games and not others must question the integrity of the competition, how can that be fair? Where are the extra refs going to come from when they can't even find 10 decent ones to stick out on the grass? The time it took for WBA's third goal was a joke, the need to use it at all when they had 6 players offside was beyond a joke. Salahs goal was checked and checked again when there was nothing to check.

 

If they give each team 1 appeal each I could just about live with that.

[Ne Moe Imya]

What if you were given two choices:

 

A. Keep using current system where 95% of calls are correct

 

OR

 

B. Switch to VAR and get 99% of calls correct but with a total delay of 2 min/game (spread across maybe 3-4 situations)

 

Which would you do? Because I'd take option B every time. For me the frustration of a few minor delays is massively outweighed by not losing to an offside goal or having a blatant penalty missed by the referee.

 

And another thing everyone is ignoring is that the delays will get shorter over time. Eventually they will realise that instead of having the referee go over and watch the replay they should just have the man in the box watch the replay himself and signal the referee with the call (similar to how they do goalline technology).

 

I think in 5 years it will flow so smoothly that the delay will be about 20 seconds at most, a tiny price to pay to hugely improve the accuracy of the refereeing.

[VladimirIlyich]

What if you were given two choices:

 

A. Keep using current system where 95% of calls are correct

 

OR

 

B. Switch to VAR and get 99% of calls correct but with a total delay of 2 min/game (spread across maybe 3-4 situations)

 

Which would you do? Because I'd take option B every time. For me the frustration of a few minor delays is massively outweighed by not losing to an offside goal or having a blatant penalty missed by the referee.

 

And another thing everyone is ignoring is that the delays will get shorter over time. Eventually they will realise that instead of having the referee go over and watch the replay they should just have the man in the box watch the replay himself and signal the referee with the call (similar to how they do goalline technology).

 

I think in 5 years it will flow so smoothly that the delay will be about 20 seconds at most, a tiny price to pay to hugely improve the accuracy of the refereeing.

I'd much rather have option A. Goal line technology is a matter of fact yet these delayed findings are still subjective and cause unnecessay delays in a fast moving sport. Better refereeing and officiating is always the best way and rather than punishing refs who make mistakes simply train them better. It's also a shame we can't ban the re-showing of major incidents over and over again by clueless pundits who've never reffed a game in their lives.

[sir roger]

What if you were given two choices:

 

A. Keep using current system where 95% of calls are correct

 

OR

 

B. Switch to VAR and get 99% of calls correct but with a total delay of 2 min/game (spread across maybe 3-4 situations)

 

Which would you do? Because I'd take option B every time. For me the frustration of a few minor delays is massively outweighed by not losing to an offside goal or having a blatant penalty missed by the referee.

 

And another thing everyone is ignoring is that the delays will get shorter over time. Eventually they will realise that instead of having the referee go over and watch the replay they should just have the man in the box watch the replay himself and signal the referee with the call (similar to how they do goalline technology).

 

I think in 5 years it will flow so smoothly that the delay will be about 20 seconds at most, a tiny price to pay to hugely improve the accuracy of the refereeing.

 

Me too, option B

 

People are also ignoring the fact that it was the only game out of 6 where the match referee felt he needed to check a screen ( He should have just gone with the VR verdict & saved 2/3 minutes ) so our game was a bit of an anomaly.

[Bob]

How is improvement from 95% to 99% vast improvement?

 

Watch the NFL. They’ve had replay review for years and it’s resulting in them not even being able to decide what is and isn’t a catch and rewrite the wording of the rules to help them.

 

A catch.

 

They don’t know what a catch is.

 

Not because people can’t catch any more, or because catching is a different thing anymore, but because of replay. Because replay can be slowed down, zoomed in and watched in 4K high definition.

 

The replay isn’t going to bed in and get better and it’ll be 20 seconds delay, it’s going to go the opposite direction with every shirt tug being watched - over and over and over - in slow motion.

 

Maybe the law of unintended consequences, but still, only gonna get worse.

[Bob]

And not to mention if you get a ref like clattenburg in charge. Imagine how much he’d love all the attention of him going to the sidelines to watch under the hood!

[3 Stacks]

VAR just disallowed a goal that was an extremely close call in the Koln vs. BVB game and the stoppage was about 3 seconds. When the refs get used to it in England, it will be fine. 

[Grinch]

They over used it west brom. Why even go there for the Salah goal?

[Kevin D]

I have been surprised about the backlash to VAR, myself.

 

I have only seen it in practice, once, against WBA and it very, very obviously worked. The decisions it came to were clearly the right ones.

 

As cynical as I am about football, I hadn't considered the possibility that nobody would give a shit that it worked.

 

And I certainly didn't consider that Liverpool fans who have watched any number of pissant teams take 15 minutes on goalkicks, subs, throw ins and any and all type of shithousery fret about how the honour of football was being undermined, because it took 2 minutes to rightly award a penalty.

[A_S]

Aye, it makes it more entertaining on telly but it’s shit for those that shell out their money to go the game.

Perhaps going the way of cricket now is the go where the 4th official is mic'd up and the screens show what he is viewing.

 

It keeps everyone informed, though there is the issue of FIFA and replays.

[A_S]

I have been surprised about the backlash to VAR, myself.

 

I have only seen it in practice, once, against WBA and it very, very obviously worked. The decisions it came to were clearly the right ones.

 

As cynical as I am about football, I hadn't considered the possibility that nobody would give a shit that it worked.

 

And I certainly didn't consider that Liverpool fans who have watched any number of pissant teams take 15 minutes on goalkicks, subs, throw ins and any and all type of shithousery fret about how the honour of football was being undermined, because it took 2 minutes to rightly award a penalty.

Can't rep because I'm on my phone, but this is spot on. There are plenty of areas the game can be sped up due to shithouse 'game management' tactics. Keepers taking goal kicks is the main one.

 

Another thing not mentioned is it might make defenders actually defend if they know they're now being watched. Pulis' Stoke team would've been relegated after a season if a closer eye had been kept on their rugby tactics.

[Kevin D]

Can't rep because I'm on my phone, but this is spot on. There are plenty of areas the game can be sped up due to shithouse 'game management' tactics. Keepers taking goal kicks is the main one.

 

Another thing not mentioned is it might make defenders actually defend if they know they're now being watched. Pulis' Stoke team would've been relegated after a season if a closer eye had been kept on their rugby tactics.

The amount of time that Rory Delap, Fraser Foster, Tony Pulls, Julian Speroni, Jose Mourinho, David Moyes and Phil Neville have all collectively stolen from me would easily get my 3rd and 4th marriages back.

[Kevin D]

(My 5th was unsavable, there is no cure for crazy)