VAR cannot be fixed

[Onionman]

Contentious title but please hear me out.

VAR can't work. Decisions in football are opinion. All VAR does is take decisions away from being the opinion of one man. I've never been an abuser of referees. They are human, they make decisions on incidents as they see them in real time. They blink, they lose concentration and they are unsighted. So, in our heart of hearts we understood that there are going to be mistakes.

The promoters of VAR gave fans to believe that now there would be some godlike judge creating utterly impartial and purely logical decisions that no-one could reasonably doubt. And what do we have? The fallible judgment of human beings only now with no excuses. They have the perfect camera angles, the slow motion, the repeat plays. And it's still just their opinion. Even when they have offside lines, the rules are crystal clear and Che Adams is offside fans are still up in arms. Because their opinion differs.

So, nothing's gained. And the game is losing its speed and it's magic. I don't celebrate goals as there's always that doubt that three minutes later someone will be using a slide rule to disallow it. It's detrimental to the sport.

People trying to fix VAR, give up. It's not possible. You will never take away the fact that people see things differently. That's the sandy foundation on which this is built.

I know plenty of you supported VAR and you're still in that mindset when you're suggesting improvements. You want it to work but it's a fool's errand. It can't be done. It's always someone's opinion so it can never work. Change your mind, give it up and fight for its abolition.

Vin

 

[Libby]

Well said

If only some of us had said this would happen...

 

[ChilcoSaint]

I was one of those who was desperate for VAR to work but it has had its chance and needs to be scrapped. Totally. Immediately.

As I said on the Referee thread, and on the Man U match thread, what we have at the moment is a perfect storm made up from 3 components:

1. Rules which make no sense and are completely subjective and open to interpretation. The position on the arm which is nowadays cited in the handball rule, which by extension applies to the offside rule as well, is clearly stated but somehow mysteriously changes from game to game and even within games.

2. The technology used for VAR is completely inadequate and it’s difficult to see how even with the money floating around in football it could be made good enough. The resolution and frame rate of the cameras is not good enough to detect the precise moment a ball is played, or the exact relative position of an attacker’s armpit to a defender’s backside. Cricket has ultra high-speed cameras which would work but these are in fixed positions at either end of the wicket and wouldn’t be adaptable to use at a football ground.

3. The standard of refereeing is woefully inadequate. Even if all the members of the PGMOL were good enough, there would remain the problem of inconsistency, both between different officials and between different games with the same referee. And as we saw yesterday, sometimes within the same game.

So yes, please, scrap VAR, which only amplifies the mistakes made by officials, and introduces uncertainty and delay into the game. One of the reasons people go to watch football at the ground, or even on TV, is to experience the sheer spontaneous joy of celebrating their team scoring a goal. This joy has been sucked out of the game and will undoubtedly result in many people not returning to grounds after the pandemic. And what have we gained? The VAR officials still get things wrong! Even VAR’s greatest defenders say things like “well it gets more decisions right than wrong”. Well whoop-dee-****ing-do. Take a huge part of the joy of football away and still get things wrong.

We are no better off in terms of getting decions correct than we were before VAR, and have paid an unacceptable price. Get rid, as soon as possible.

 

[Che’s Godlike Thighs]

Give each team just one chance to ask for VAR per game, like cricket. Otherwise, let the ref get on with it.

 

[mowgli]

Give each team just one chance to ask for VAR per game, like cricket. Otherwise, let the ref get on with it.

That would not have made any difference Sunday. Bertie's handball was given - not enough to overturn. Neves handball was not given - not enough to overturn. Just crap refereeing in the first instance.

 

[Che’s Godlike Thighs]

That would not have made any difference Sunday. Bertie's handball was given - not enough to overturn. Neves handball was not given - not enough to overturn. Just crap refereeing in the first instance.

Right, but if the nonsense handball rule was changed, as being discussed on another thread, things would be better. I think it's a bit ridiculous to just throw the idea of VAR away so quickly after it has come into operation, particularly as we were asking for it for donkey's years.

Just needs fine-tuning, and some of the rules altering (ie; clear and obvious for an offside, deliberate handball for a pen). It can be done. Unfortunately though we have FIFA making the decisions and we all know how incompetent they are.

 

[Velcro Roy]

That would not have made any difference Sunday. Bertie's handball was given - not enough to overturn. Neves handball was not given - not enough to overturn. Just crap refereeing in the first instance.

Further proof VAR isn't req'd.

 

[Onionman]

Right, but if the nonsense handball rule was changed, as being discussed on another thread, things would be better. I think it's a bit ridiculous to just throw the idea of VAR away so quickly after it has come into operation, particularly as we were asking for it for donkey's years.

Just needs fine-tuning, and some of the rules altering (ie; clear and obvious for an offside, deliberate handball for a pen). It can be done. Unfortunately though we have FIFA making the decisions and we all know how incompetent they are.

Clear and obvious is an opinion. Deliberate is an opinion. It's for exactly that reason I'm arguing that there is no fix.

"Change the offside rule so there's 300mm of leeway." All that does is move the line 300mm up the pitch. "Change it so there has to be clear daylight between players" and it moves the problem a body's width up the pitch. Someone will still draw lines and someone will be 10mm offside and pundits will say how stupid it is. This will go on forever, no-one will be happy and the game will still be slowly being strangled.

Not all of us were asking for VAR. Plus, if something doesn't work and you realise that it can't be fixed, the time to drop it is now.

Vin

 

[Onionman]

My argument against VAR was that it wouldn't work in practice. I used to ask how it would be implemented. I don't think anyone answered. So here's a question I'd like to have answered.

How, specifically and in detail, would you change the rules or the way VAR works in such a way that, for example, Saturday's handball decisions could be called to the satisfaction of Southampton, Wolves and independent fans? Please be specific.

Vin

 

[Libby]

Right, but if the nonsense handball rule was changed, as being discussed on another thread, things would be better. I think it's a bit ridiculous to just throw the idea of VAR away so quickly after it has come into operation, particularly as we were asking for it for donkey's years.

Just needs fine-tuning, and some of the rules altering (ie; clear and obvious for an offside, deliberate handball for a pen). It can be done. Unfortunately though we have FIFA making the decisions and we all know how incompetent they are.

Not everyone was calling for it though. There was plenty of us voicing concerns about it that have come to pass. What have FIFA done? They don't write the rules.

This isn't aimed specifically at you but it makes me laugh at how many people seem to think that we need to rewrite the rulebook to make VAR work. Almost makes you wonder how we coped for over a century.

 

[Ronnie Hotdog (MLsfc)]

The only way to remove all debate for offsides is to have microchipped footballs and boots at the top level - you could tell exactly when ball was kicked by the impact and so long as players have the chip in the same place in the boot, it would be equal for all teams.

This will never happen as it would require ridiculous innovation and every player to have multiple pairs of microchipped boots - in other words, it is too bloody expensive!

 

[Che’s Godlike Thighs]

Not everyone was calling for it though. There was plenty of us voicing concerns about it that have come to pass. What have FIFA done? They don't write the rules.

This isn't aimed specifically at you but it makes me laugh at how many people seem to think that we need to rewrite the rulebook to make VAR work. Almost makes you wonder how we coped for over a century.

But we weren’t coping were we? A good example would be the League Cup final loss to Utd.

 

[Onionman]

But we weren’t coping were we? A good example would be the League Cup final loss to Utd.

As would the penalty we were awarded when Jose Fonte was tackled about six feet outside the box against Brighton. Or Fonte's invisibility cloak the season he committed about six penalty-worthy fouls that weren't given.

I don't recall Saints' fans begging for VAR to be introduced after those games. What was different? They were equally egregious mistakes.

Vin

 

[Libby]

But we weren’t coping were we? A good example would be the League Cup final loss to Utd.

We still had hundreds of thousands of people attending games every weekend. It's not like people wanted to stop going because of wrong decisions. The vast majority accepted them for what they are and got on with it; it's the modern social media driven entitlement that has led to this imo.

There's also no guarantee that that would have been overturned, they may well have said Bertrand was interfering with play. I've seen worse decisions since VAR was brought in.

Plus, Bournemouth were literally relegated by a VAR failure last year so it's not really made any difference there has it?

And that is the crux of the issue, we've essentially got what we always had with some going for you and some going against you. We've just got a less enjoyable sport with the emotion sucked out to go with it.

 

[One of yer Norvern Saints]

Like many, I welcomed VAR. How could we not after the dreadful decision at Wembley that cost us so dearly. But I always thought it would be some geezer with a few screens in front of him whispering into the ref's ear if he dropped an obvious bollock. So when that bugger from Watford scrambled in a last minute equaliser against us the man with the screen could simply say 'Hang on. He handled it'. At Wembley that day a quick 'No, he's onside, the assitant's flag is wrong' would have changed the game.

How many times have we seen a goal scored against us and shouted 'He's offside, ref' - and we were probably wrong - and then gone home nursing a grievance. It was part of the match-day experience. What we wanted from VAR was a reversal of the clear and obvious error.

What I wanted was, for example, Salah to be called offside as he set up an equaliser against us a couple of years back despite, as one of my mates said, being in ****ing Gosport when the ball was played to him! It was a clear and obvious error. An extra pair of eyes is no bad thing, but VAR is a monster we've created, and like the OP I find my enjoyment is rapidly fading. Before VAR, that Ings volley would have had me leaping out of my seat. Now I'm holding back until VAR have decided it's a legitimate goal. So on VAR, Blackadder almost said, there's only one teent weeny flaw. It;s bollocks.

 

[Libby]

The thing I find interesting is that you can find plenty of people who were for it but have now changed their mind but how many the other way round?

 

[West Kent Saint]

On balance, I’d be happy to see it go. Not what I thought it would be. Like someone said, if it was someone who could just tell the ref you’ve dropped a bollock then fine, but it is essentially opinion being passed onto someone else as I think Vin is saying. Maybe going back to the days of **** ref good ref is easier to bare?

 

[Velcro Roy]

Those of you who are thinking of not going to live games anymore because of VAR should write and tell the league,falling attendances does not make good PR.

 

[RedandWhiteManofKent]

My argument against VAR was that it wouldn't work in practice. I used to ask how it would be implemented. I don't think anyone answered. So here's a question I'd like to have answered.

How, specifically and in detail, would you change the rules or the way VAR works in such a way that, for example, Saturday's handball decisions could be called to the satisfaction of Southampton, Wolves and independent fans? Please be specific.

Vin

The handball situation had as much to do with the referees decision rather than var and that is something that can be changed. The ref gave one and not the other and var did not override it. It should. If the ref had given us the penalty var would likely have backed it. The handball rule is what needs to be sorted out.

Agree, the offside makes it a joke and if it's not obvious on a real time replay then award the goal, no need for graphics.

I wouldn't be upset if var was scrapped tomorrow, I would be upset if it continued in its current form. But I still think it can be improved.

 

[saintrichie123]

Interviews are now taking place for var officials.......here’s a picture of the hopefuls.

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