It's Football, not Soccer

My personal views on The Beautiful Game

Video Killed the Radio Star

November 12, 2017 by Steve Collins

Northern Ireland were on the wrong end of an awful refereeing decision the other night, in their World Cup play-off match against Switzerland, when they had a penalty awarded against them for handball. The fledgling VAR system was not in use, and so there was no opportunity for the decision to be reviewed and changed.

If you are not aware of what VAR is, it stands for Video Assistant Referees, and it is slowly being introduced by FIFA to try to get more correct decisions. It has been used in the USA and in Australia, more recently in Italy, Germany and Portugal, and was available for the first time in the UK at the England v Germany match last Friday night, although it was not called into use during the match.

It is totally separate from the after-match reviews and retrospective punishment for violent conduct missed by the match officials, and punishment for diving for penalties, that we have only just started to understand and accept.

Briefly, the incidents to be reviewed by VAR are
1. Goals. Goals awarded by the match referee may be chalked-off after review.
2. Penalties. Penalty decisions may be reversed…both ways!
3. Red Cards. Decisions to award or not award a red card, may be reviewed and changed.
4. Mistaken Identity. Making sure that the correct player gets the card.

Probably the biggest drawback is that these various reviews are going to take place in real-time, and we football fans are not used to it. Cricket is very much a stop-start game and reviews on wickets does not cause the game to stall. Rugby Union is more of a stop-start game than football and so waiting for a review on a try is not such an issue. But with football we expect play to be continuous and it will be difficult to accept the hold-ups. Even now, if we think a player is feigning injury, we get annoyed that the flow of the game is being interrupted. Goal-line technology works because the video analysis only takes a matter of seconds, and the question only needs a yes/no answer.

But just as video killed the radio star, I believe that VAR is going to be a total game-changer, and will become the most significant law change in football for many years. It will be confusing to most and argued about by everybody in the game, but if it is used sensibly, and for me it is a massive if, then more important decisions will be correct, and many of the injustices that we can all painfully bring to mind could be almost eliminated.

So, are we really ready for VAR to force us to sit on our hands for a couple of minutes to give the officials the best chance to make the right decision? If you were to ask some Northern Ireland fans yes or no, I think I know what answer you would get!

Share this:

  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
  • More
  • Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)

Like this:

Like Loading...

Related

Posted in: Football Tagged: VAR
← Cry
Reasons To Be Cheerful →

Tag Cloud

England football Premier League Referee Tactics VAR Walking football World Cup 2018

The last few posts

  • Hard Shoulder February 25, 2020
  • VAR – Time to make changes February 17, 2020
  • It’s Getting Better October 23, 2019
  • World Cup first round matches – My favourite bits June 21, 2018
  • Simply the Best June 17, 2018
  • Against All Odds June 11, 2018
  • Down Down May 6, 2018

Thank you

Thanks for taking the time to read my posts.

I’m new to all this and so any feedback is much appreciated.

Recent Posts

  • Hard Shoulder February 25, 2020
  • VAR – Time to make changes February 17, 2020
  • It’s Getting Better October 23, 2019
  • World Cup first round matches – My favourite bits June 21, 2018
  • Simply the Best June 17, 2018

Copyright © 2025 It's Football, not Soccer.

Omega WordPress Theme by ThemeHall

%d