A&H

Barnsley vs Chelsea

The Referee Store
Regardless of my views on VAR, I don't buy that having it in some FA cup games and others is "unfair". It would be grossly unfair if some league games games had it and others in the same division didn't, but VAR decisions in a cup game will only affect that game, they will have no impact whatsoever ever on any other games. It is no different to some 3rd round FA Cup games having GLT but the majority not and that has been the case since GLT was brought in.
 
Regardless of my views on VAR, I don't buy that having it in some FA cup games and others is "unfair". It would be grossly unfair if some league games games had it and others in the same division didn't, but VAR decisions in a cup game will only affect that game, they will have no impact whatsoever ever on any other games. It is no different to some 3rd round FA Cup games having GLT but the majority not and that has been the case since GLT was brought in.
I didn't see the 'fairness' in it, but put like that - yes you have a point.

Really no different to the different levels of referee used in the FA Cup as a whole when you think about it and yes spot on re GLT as well.
 
I used the term 'arguably unfair', simply because that's just how its commonly perceived. Even if it is 'fair', it won't 'sit well' with many people

The elite game is faced with an impossible future. On the one hand;
An undeniable demand for flawlessly refereed games (which we know is impossible when refereeing is largely subjective)
On the other;
Without spoiling the game (I'd say the majority of EPL fans are dissatisfied on this score)

Technology advancing at breakneck pace has ultimately been the catalyst for change in the game. Alas, I doubt 'the suits' in FIFA or IFAB know how to send a text message. It's put the game in 'coffin corner'. A clear demand that VAR be introduced, but with it a virtual certainty of detracting from the game itself. Like I've said, I can't see the 'exit signs'
 
Last edited:
I have another theory (I can hear those groans!) why VAR sits 'uneasily' shall we say, with many, including those on here.

We are all aware of the pre match instructions we give and/or are given regarding the big decisions by the referee.

Now imagine a world where that pre match mirrored the VAR approach.

" I will give or not a penalty. However if you feel I have made a mistake, stick your flag up and we're come over and spend a couple of minutes chatting about it"

There's a reason we don't do that!, yet we are to accept that its perfectly fine for VAR to in effect "stick his flag up" everytime (yes, yes I know its not EVERY time) he thinks the ref has got it 'wrong'
 
I have another theory (I can hear those groans!) why VAR sits 'uneasily' shall we say, with many, including those on here.

We are all aware of the pre match instructions we give and/or are given regarding the big decisions by the referee.

Now imagine a world where that pre match mirrored the VAR approach.

" I will give or not a penalty. However if you feel I have made a mistake, stick your flag up and we're come over and spend a couple of minutes chatting about it"

There's a reason we don't do that!, yet we are to accept that its perfectly fine for VAR to in effect "stick his flag up" everytime (yes, yes I know its not EVERY time) he thinks the ref has got it 'wrong'
Surely the difference is that the AR (like you) only has one look at it. VAR can have as many as they like?
 
I have another theory (I can hear those groans!) why VAR sits 'uneasily' shall we say, with many, including those on here.

We are all aware of the pre match instructions we give and/or are given regarding the big decisions by the referee.

Now imagine a world where that pre match mirrored the VAR approach.

" I will give or not a penalty. However if you feel I have made a mistake, stick your flag up and we're come over and spend a couple of minutes chatting about it"

There's a reason we don't do that!, yet we are to accept that its perfectly fine for VAR to in effect "stick his flag up" everytime (yes, yes I know its not EVERY time) he thinks the ref has got it 'wrong'

It is fairly rare that the VAR tells the referee he has got a penalty decision wrong, it really has to be a bit of a clanger to tick the clear and obvious error box, especially now they have lowered the bar on handling offences. That might be the kind of decision where before VAR an assistant would have been on the comms or buzzer telling him he was making a mistake.

The more common situations are offside or was the foul inside or outside the area, and they are so tight none of the officiating team would have questioned them before VAR.
 
Surely the difference is that the AR (like you) only has one look at it. VAR can have as many as they like?
Yes of course that's true and I realise that flaw in my slightly tongue in cheek argument.

However, the principle, especially for a subjective penalty decision where the referee has a good view still holds.

If the referee has seen it, from a good viewpoint, gives it but then VAR looks at it 6 times, ref goes to monitor looks at it 6 times and THEN they decide to change the decision, having taken several minutes about it, can't you see how that sits uneasily with a sizeable amount of people?

Just watched a re run of an RA development session and when they show the clips there are ALWAYS different opinions - this from an audience of 100% referees who have given up their Sunday afternoon to 'attend'. Even the 'tutors' (In this case SG2 referees) acknowledge that their opinion on the sanction/incident isn't the only 'correct' option.

As BigCat says VAR is chasing an impossible dream - 100% correct decisions that everyone is happy with - we're told from day 1 on our training that this is an impossible aim in any match, however good you are.
 
Last edited:
It is fairly rare that the VAR tells the referee he has got a penalty decision wrong, it really has to be a bit of a clanger to tick the clear and obvious error box, especially now they have lowered the bar on handling offences. That might be the kind of decision where before VAR an assistant would have been on the comms or buzzer telling him he was making a mistake.

The more common situations are offside or was the foul inside or outside the area, and they are so tight none of the officiating team would have questioned them before VAR.
Can't agree with the possible intervention by the AR there RR.

On the training session just mentioned, an SG2 referee specifically said that if he made the call from a good position (this was simulation in the PA), even if AR thought/knew he had got it wrong, he did NOT want any intervention from the AR, as he was happy to stand (or fall) by his decision.

On a broader point, I'm with Anthony Taylor on this one in general, where I have heard him say a couple of times now, that both within refereeing and outside we have become too obsessed with labelling everything 'right' or 'wrong' - if the referee from a clear view has made an honest, within law decision then go with it - he's done nothing wrong, so lets stop labelling it as such - another thread that one perhaps!

Also, for me at least, it matters not if they change it or not, you are still looking at a subjective decision made in good faith etc for 2 mins to 'check' its OK?

Not expecting you to agree - that's fine - just trying to expand on the reasons for my frustration with VAR.
 
Can't agree with the possible intervention by the AR there RR.

On the training session just mentioned, an SG2 referee specifically said that if he made the call from a good position (this was simulation in the PA), even if AR thought/knew he had got it wrong, he did NOT want any intervention from the AR, as he was happy to stand (or fall) by his decision.

On a broader point, I'm with Anthony Taylor on this one in general, where I have heard him say a couple of times now, that both within refereeing and outside we have become too obsessed with labelling everything 'right' or 'wrong' - if the referee from a clear view has made an honest, within law decision then go with it - he's done nothing wrong, so lets stop labelling it as such - another thread that one perhaps!

Also, for me at least, it matters not if they change it or not, you are still looking at a subjective decision made in good faith etc for 2 mins to 'check' its OK?

Not expecting you to agree - that's fine - just trying to expand on the reasons for my frustration with VAR.

Giving advice over comms isn't intervening or an intervention though, certainly isn't the same as making any publicly recognisable symbol like putting the flag up. They discuss every decision during the game so I wouldn't have thought this is any different.

Just about everyone wanted VAR, save perhaps for the match officials themselves. Supporters say they didn't now, but at the time they berated referees and assistants for getting decisions wrong and said they wanted action taking. Players and managers definitely wanted it, as did the media. Many people in those groups now don't like it as decisions have gone against their teams that previously they would have got away with, it isn't going anywhere though and VAR is here to stay for ever. It might get tweaked along the way, but it will never get removed and everyone is just going to have to get used to it. If artificial intelligence (AI) continues to advance as it has in the past couple of years there will in the not too distant future the capabilities to make decisions without even needing VAR, like offside, ball in or out of play, essentially anything that isn't "in the opinion of the referee / AR".
 
Giving advice over comms isn't intervening or an intervention though, certainly isn't the same as making any publicly recognisable symbol like putting the flag up. They discuss every decision during the game so I wouldn't have thought this is any different.

Just about everyone wanted VAR, save perhaps for the match officials themselves. Supporters say they didn't now, but at the time they berated referees and assistants for getting decisions wrong and said they wanted action taking. Players and managers definitely wanted it, as did the media. Many people in those groups now don't like it as decisions have gone against their teams that previously they would have got away with, it isn't going anywhere though and VAR is here to stay for ever. It might get tweaked along the way, but it will never get removed and everyone is just going to have to get used to it. If artificial intelligence (AI) continues to advance as it has in the past couple of years there will in the not too distant future the capabilities to make decisions without even needing VAR, like offside, ball in or out of play, essentially anything that isn't "in the opinion of the referee / AR".
Hope you're right about the "tweaking", but wrong about AI - how depressing would that be!
 
Giving advice over comms isn't intervening or an intervention though, certainly isn't the same as making any publicly recognisable symbol like putting the flag up. They discuss every decision during the game so I wouldn't have thought this is any different.

Just about everyone wanted VAR, save perhaps for the match officials themselves. Supporters say they didn't now, but at the time they berated referees and assistants for getting decisions wrong and said they wanted action taking. Players and managers definitely wanted it, as did the media. Many people in those groups now don't like it as decisions have gone against their teams that previously they would have got away with, it isn't going anywhere though and VAR is here to stay for ever. It might get tweaked along the way, but it will never get removed and everyone is just going to have to get used to it. If artificial intelligence (AI) continues to advance as it has in the past couple of years there will in the not too distant future the capabilities to make decisions without even needing VAR, like offside, ball in or out of play, essentially anything that isn't "in the opinion of the referee / AR".
Without detailing each point you've made, there are many that I fully agree with but some that I'd take issue with 🤨

Not often I disagree with @PinnerPaul , but AI is a partial exit strategy... potentially
The consideration which most frequently impacts on the enjoyment of the game, is that of offside
Offside is the most likely and frequent 'Check/Review' that has supressed the spontaneity of goal celebrations. That killing of spontaneity has been the biggest downside of VAR for me
My vision, is that AI will soon decide upon offsides, (akin to GLT) with an alert sent to the AR to raise the flag as required. As with GLT, I think there's potential for this to be a fairly instantaneous outcome. We accept the AI decision based on a certain tolerance and the AI will improve on accuracy over time. Spontaneity restored, maximum use of the technology, accurate decisions, minimum impact. It would tick all the boxes
As we know, I'd rather just ditch VAR and sort out the culture and behaviour problems in the game, failing that, the 'direction of travel' is to rely upon technology to the point that AI could feature quite soon
 
Without detailing each point you've made, there are many that I fully agree with but some that I'd take issue with 🤨

Not often I disagree with @PinnerPaul , but AI is a partial exit strategy... potentially
The consideration which most frequently impacts on the enjoyment of the game, is that of offside
Offside is the most likely and frequent 'Check/Review' that has supressed the spontaneity of goal celebrations. That killing of spontaneity has been the biggest downside of VAR for me
My vision, is that AI will soon decide upon offsides, (akin to GLT) with an alert sent to the AR to raise the flag as required. As with GLT, I think there's potential for this to be a fairly instantaneous outcome. We accept the AI decision based on a certain tolerance and the AI will improve on accuracy over time. Spontaneity restored, maximum use of the technology, accurate decisions, minimum impact. It would tick all the boxes
As we know, I'd rather just ditch VAR and sort out the culture and behaviour problems in the game, failing that, the 'direction of travel' is to rely upon technology to the point that AI could feature quite soon

Not quite, as AI will not for a long time be able to determine if the player in an offside position is interfering with an opponent or gaining an advantage. They will need human decision making for those, although I can certainly foresee a time where the AR is told over comms that the player was offside at the time of the pass and they then have to make that judgement.
 
Not quite, as AI will not for a long time be able to determine if the player in an offside position is interfering with an opponent or gaining an advantage. They will need human decision making for those, although I can certainly foresee a time where the AR is told over comms that the player was offside at the time of the pass and they then have to make that judgement.
Fair point WRT gaining advantage. The vast majority of offside checks are merely factual however
I say, 'factual' (although I'm not sure the term 'factual' is ever appropriate). I don't think this idea is science fiction, but I also think we'd have to accept a fair degree of imprecision to begin with (which oddly, is better than the armpit business we have today)
 
Without detailing each point you've made, there are many that I fully agree with but some that I'd take issue with 🤨

Not often I disagree with @PinnerPaul , but AI is a partial exit strategy... potentially
The consideration which most frequently impacts on the enjoyment of the game, is that of offside
Offside is the most likely and frequent 'Check/Review' that has supressed the spontaneity of goal celebrations. That killing of spontaneity has been the biggest downside of VAR for me
My vision, is that AI will soon decide upon offsides, (akin to GLT) with an alert sent to the AR to raise the flag as required. As with GLT, I think there's potential for this to be a fairly instantaneous outcome. We accept the AI decision based on a certain tolerance and the AI will improve on accuracy over time. Spontaneity restored, maximum use of the technology, accurate decisions, minimum impact. It would tick all the boxes
As we know, I'd rather just ditch VAR and sort out the culture and behaviour problems in the game, failing that, the 'direction of travel' is to rely upon technology to the point that AI could feature quite soon
You're right we don't often disagree but we do here.;)

GLT is one ball, one line and we don't have to concern ourselves what the ball is doing - 'intefering with play'; 'preventing an opponent gaining possession or playing the ball' ; 'attempting to playing the ball close to him', 'gaining an advantage by being that position' - good luck with getting an 'instant response' to that lot!

And as for 'investing' in AI to see if the ball has gone out of play for a throw in, yep that's the big game changer the throw in - well.......................:rolleyes:

Football hates change but when it does it certainly won't change again!

I AM with you, and to a lesser extent Rusty on that we're stuck with VAR.

Here's my, for what its worth 'solution' - again we're back with hockey, where the referee only requests a review - it can be heard and seen by all. The one I saw was for a goal following a penalty corner and before restarting play we all heard the ref say "Can I just look at that goal again, I'm looking for possible interference by Blue 10 on Red 5" It was played on the big screen that the crowd and the referee watched. Sorted.

Any penalties referees not sure about then they ask for a review, but if not go with their decision and guess what, yep they won't get100% right but then the other 98% of us without VAR don't either!
 
On a side note, have you notice tennis line judges have been replaced by hawk eye? So if you were thinking of AR as a profession, you may want to think of alternatives. Although at the rate VAR is going, this would be an advice you would want to give to your great grand children.
 
It is fairly rare that the VAR tells the referee he has got a penalty decision wrong, it really has to be a bit of a clanger to tick the clear and obvious error box, especially now they have lowered the bar on handling offences. That might be the kind of decision where before VAR an assistant would have been on the comms or buzzer telling him he was making a mistake.

The more common situations are offside or was the foul inside or outside the area, and they are so tight none of the officiating team would have questioned them before VAR.
I see that the "fairly rare" occurrence happened twice (from 4 games) yesterday! :p ;)
 
Back
Top