VAR and is there a way to fix it?

[biziclop]

I'm not really sure what point you're making here. Intent hasn't got anything to do with offside, and that's the main bone of contention with VAR. And I said we need automated checks for those anyway.

"interfering with an opponent" says hi.

You can (and should) in theory check automatically whether someone is in an offside position, though not with the methods currently in use. But whether it's an offence very much depends on your intent, i.e. did you try to play the ball or did you, and I quote, "make an obvious action which clearly impacts on the ability of an opponent to play the ball".

I hope you can see what the problem here is, how it relies on the referee's perception of what the players were trying to do.

[AjaxAndy]

I've always been in favour of scrapping it, but the standard of officiating this season has been so bad I'm not sure it's even feasible to put full responsibility on this current crop of refs.

Maybe their standards have dropped because they're relying on VAR so much, but there needs to be a big improvement in their performances if we did abolish VAR.

[CannockPricey]

The trouble with it is everyone would be happy if it just corrected clangers and left the really really marginal and debatable alone rather than delaying the game for 5mins for a half inch offside decision.

The problem is it doesn't always correct the clangers. The Luton pen v Wolves when it clearly deflected off the leg. Obvious on first viewing and not corrected.

Then you get DCL's challenge v Palace. Initial decision, no foul which was correct. By the time VAR has got involved it was a straight red.

There are numerous examples of horrific decisions so they haven't gone but what has gone is the spontaneity of goal celebrations.

I am with Wolves. Any very marginal improvement it has made has been outweighed by the impact on the game and using it for subjective calls (is it a foul? Is it yellow? Is it red?) is utterly pointless.

Hair's breadth offsides can go as well so having not wanted it in the first place I would now prefer it was just binned.

[Shogun]

That DCL one was really bad. Would have been a month long news story if it happened to the shite.

[AjaxAndy]

That DCL one was really bad. Would have been a month long news story if it happened to the shite.

Unless I'm mistaken they never released the audio from that one either

[AllyBlue14]

"interfering with an opponent" says hi.

You can (and should) in theory check automatically whether someone is in an offside position, though not with the methods currently in use. But whether it's an offence very much depends on your intent, i.e. did you try to play the ball or did you, and I quote, "make an obvious action which clearly impacts on the ability of an opponent to play the ball".

I hope you can see what the problem here is, how it relies on the referee's perception of what the players were trying to do.

You're incredibly patronising, aren't you?

Being able to determine whether a player is interfering from an offside position really isn't the biggest problem facing VAR. As pretty much everyone else has said, it's gauging whether a player is marginally off or not and the crap lines they seem to draw themselves.

If they can sort out that satisfactorily, the rest should fall into place more easily.

For instances of interference - again, as we've all said - yes, you'd need a referee to decide, and the ideal would be someone who understands the game properly.

There are obviously nuances but the main issues at the moment are the current system for adjudging offside and the inconsistent application of the rules.

[biziclop]

You're incredibly patronising, aren't you?

I tend to react badly to people arguing in bad faith, and "offside doesn't depend on intent" is a bad faith argument from someone who understands the laws of the game. (Not to mention the weird goalpost shifting from VAR to just offsides, but I thought I'd let that slide at the start.)

If you want to argue for argument's sake, fine but please do it with someone else.

[AllyBlue14]

If you want to argue for argument's sake, fine but please do it with someone else.

I was going to say exactly the same thing because you either wilfully misinterpreted my initial point or didn't understand it.

Either way, it wasn't controversial or personally offensive in the slightest, so I don't see why you're being so objectionable.

[biziclop]

I was going to say exactly the same thing because you either wilfully misinterpreted my initial point or didn't understand it.

Either way, it wasn't controversial or personally offensive in the slightest, so I don't see why you're being so objectionable.

Fair enough, maybe I am just cranky. In any case, apologies.

P.s.: also I didn't twig that you were probably only talking about offsides from the start, thought you were talking about VAR in general, so I can see how that could make my response come across like a non-sequitur.

[Cods]

The worst thing has been so many of the VAR penalties given for slow motion handballs or 'fouls' in the box. Game defining decisions.

There have been terrible calls where a ref views something at one tenth speed that makes something look so much worse. Inconsequential contact at super slow motion, that at real speed is negligible and wouldn't, or shouldn't, have been given.

[Cods]

Not sure how anyone can argue that they don't do everything they can to promote entertainmemt over integrity. Disgraceful.

[TheRam]

It can be argued quite easily.

For that statement to be true you’d need all the officials to be in cahoots with the people who run the league.

They’d be so many decision across the season that will contradict what you’re saying.

Why did liverpool have a perfectly good goal not allowed?

Why did they not award Forest a pen against ourselves to keep the relegation fight alive?

It mirrors society and the big conspiracy that there’s a group of people behind the shadows controlling everything.

But what’s more realistic?

The above statement, or the fact the people in charge who we are supposed to trust are in-fact incompetent which is why we see all sorts of crisis in the world.

Same goes for the officials in this country. Are they really corrupt wanting certain results for entertainment, or are they just really incompetent.

We’re talking about match fixing on a huge scale here. It just isn’t possible.

[biziclop]

I kind of understand where this idea is coming from because it's definitely what all the English footy media wanted to see and boy did they bang the fuck on about it for days.

Is it possible that this somehow subconsciously affected the referee? Possibly, although I feel it more likely that it was your classic "home advantage" that seems to benefit popular teams more.

But is it something that was orchestrated? No, I mean come on, these guys couldn't even orchestrate a rendition of 4'33".

[Cods]

It can be argued quite easily.

For that statement to be true you’d need all the officials to be in cahoots with the people who run the league.

They’d be so many decision across the season that will contradict what you’re saying.

Why did liverpool have a perfectly good goal not allowed?

Why did they not award Forest a pen against ourselves to keep the relegation fight alive?

It mirrors society and the big conspiracy that there’s a group of people behind the shadows controlling everything.

But what’s more realistic?

The above statement, or the fact the people in charge who we are supposed to trust are in-fact incompetent which is why we see all sorts of crisis in the world.

Same goes for the officials in this country. Are they really corrupt wanting certain results for entertainment, or are they just really incompetent.

We’re talking about match fixing on a huge scale here. It just isn’t possible.

Yes sorry, clarity of multiple ideas and words, and semi conscious lazy post at 3am. It wasn't meant to be a full blown conspiracy theory.

Was meaning more from the point of individual integrity, and integrity of a group.

The hard and correct decision today (yesterday) would have been to award hand ball. I don't think there can be any doubt about that. A deliberate action by the player to use his arm.

Around the psychology of referees and VAR avoiding making the hard but correct decisions, that had the consequences of alot of noise and lights, yet choose the easy option. We've seen it plenty of times. And it's not particularly partisan. I'm not denying the likes of Forest, Wolves, Bournemouth, Burnley etc also get the rough end.

The top 6, and even moreso the top 3 currently, rarely have these sort of decisions work against them, (if they do the story is endlessly highlighted), or otherwise often have them work in their favour.

I've little doubt that a referee in a title deciding match isn't somewhat predisposed to doing whatever they can to be prepared not to make a major clanger which might have an impact on the challenging team. They (probably excluding Clattenberg) just don't seem to be the extrovert attention-seeking type that would want to draw that kind of attention. For the other team involved, I don't think they're anywhere near as fussed by an error.

There's also a keen interest from the league and their broadcasters to quash or minimise any story or event that is controversial or against a preferred or comfortable popular outcome. There's little active care for actual balance, or even an attempt to make it appear so. Relegation story, champions story. It's pretty obvious they want it written from a particular angle as much as they can. It's sanitised, and it's not an objective story, or evenly balanced. It's popularity and a prescribed narrative, over integrity and truth.

We don't see the best or impartial commentators the sport has to offer, two glaring Arsenal misses today were addressed by Andy Townsend around luck and misfortune, whereas if instead the colour were blue, we all know it would have sounded more like terrible and costly misses, "must do better", all negative and strong language. It's consistent and widespread, and not solely due to the affiliation the commentator might still have had with the team they used to play for.

Obviously the existence of one doesn't prove the other or that they're necessarily connected, I shouldn't have juxtaposed both, but there are far too many instances of avoidance, or preference where Everton and smaller clubs are hard done by, they dovetail too nicely to think there's no bias or favouritism whether it's conscious or not (referees decisions) or deliberate (the league and their entwined organisations), and it really needs addressing.

[Toffee1]