VAR

I don't like it in it's current format and wish that the officials could use it when they needed it rather than the VAR checking absolutely everything.

 

I've always been against it. It's something that they have been bullied into adding without any thought.

If you look at GLT that was something Football was put under pressure to add for ages but they didn't let themselves get forced into it because it wasn't fit for purpose at the time. Look at tennis as an example, Hawkeye takes an age and the margin of error is actually fairly high. Instead, football said they need it more accurate, consistent and quick and even though the tech companies said the requirements were impossible to meet and it seemed that way as in the open test sessions every solution failed multiple times but footballs big business so these companies kept refinding their tech and we soon had a situation where multiple solutions all passes. And because of that GLT is brilliant, it doesn't disrupt the game as its quick, its consistent no matter the location of the goal it happens or the height the ball is at and the margin of error is tiny.

And that's the kind of requirements all tech in football should have to abide by. VAR fails on pretty much every count, it's slow, it still involves a massive amount of opinion and its not even able to be used consistently.

There is alot of upcoming tech that it would have been better off holding off on VAR and putting the money and resources into that. For example, a lot of clubs data analysis departments currently use player tracking of both training and matches. While its not used live during the matches its certainly something it could do, infact the NFL has been using it in matches on a test basis. This would, for example, potentially allow an instant decision on offsides. Maybe even accurately than a person as it can even use algorithms to decide when a person who is offside is interfering which for the officials is difficult and even for a VAR official ends up being opinion as they have no hard data to decide. Another area it could resolve is if a foul in or outside the box as it would have exact data on where the players are.

Tech can be great for sport but the question always has to be asked if the tech in question is right for each sport. Just because its right for one doesn't mean its right for another

 

Cricket only has the umpire overrule on certain situations because the Hawkeye system they use, like the one in Tennis has a significant margin of error because both sports did what Football didn’t do with with Hawkeye and they rushed to add it rather than wait until it was almost perfect. It’s that rushing that’s the problem now with VAR, they didn’t bother to work out if it was fit for purpose or wait for it to become fit for purpose.

On the offside situation with Lingard the problem with video is it just can’t get macro enough with the footage to know when the ball is played. If you move it back just a fraction of a second Lingard is on but you really can’t tell the exact moment the pass was made. It’s somewhat guess work. It’s why other tech would do a much better job if only football gave the people developing such tech a real motivation to get it ready like they did when they developed the requirements that GLT would need to meet. Player tracking and maybe combined with some kind of sensor on the ball itself would clear up offsides and provide and instant answer

 

You can't really 'refine' video that much though, it's an old tech and there aren't really many improvements you can make. About the only thing you could do is make it 8k footage filmed in high frame rate to allow more clarity and granularity in isolating the frames but not only will that mean it takes longer to make a decision but 8K HFR cameras are ridiculously expensive, broadcasting that out to the VAR control centre requires a massive amount of bandwidth and when it reaches the VAR centre they need 8K HFR monitors which certainly aren't available on the consumer market and if they are available commercially will cost a hundreds of thousands at the very least and they will need multiple ones. And all that expense only results in a tiny improvement.

It's why the NFL who have used video replays for ages have been experimenting with other tech because VAR makes way too many mistakes and isn't going to improve all that much. And that's with a sport where most decisions are much more clear cut than Football (And the nature of the game with it being play-based means its much quicker to generate the replays)

 

No, it hasn't. It's only a handball if the arm extended beyond a ‘natural silhouette’ to make themselves ‘unnaturally bigger’

if it hits your hand and its down by your side its not handball

 

It’s an IFAB change so it’s the whole of football