So sad that we're going to get a Harry Potter marathon on ITV4 from this, but nobody is going to screen Nuns on the Run
Thought he was in his 60s (same age as the rest of the "alternative comedy\" cadre of the early 80s) .
So Rock of Gibraltar has died at the age of 23. Anyone who knows the story understands how this horse is directly linked to the Glazers buying Utd. Not too many Utd fans will be mourning it’s passing.
Long post apologies! I am posting this here and not in last night matchday thread because although it’s the events of last night and the aftermath that has crystalised my thoughts it is more general than that. I am not going to go on about the rights and wrongs of the actual decision last night, but I am going to take issue with VAR in general. I have seen and read quite a lot today about this subject with Sky being properly pro VAR and people like Dermot Gallagher telling us that the 4 mins taken last night is acceptable and that this what we all signed up for. It is not, fans in general were not fussed about VAR and football without it is without a question a better game to watch in the stadium. I was at Leyton Orient on Tuesday and at Spurs last night and my enjoyment of the game on Tuesday was not diminished by the lack of VAR. Whereas last night it was ruined by it! And not just by the goal being disallowed but by the whole process and the lack of clarity as to what is happening. Properly used VAR can be a good thing ensuring that correct decisions re fouls, bad tackles and penalties, and even obvious offsides, are made and that is a good thing. Forensic processing of offsides that cannot be discerned by the human eye is not what anybody wants. Looking at last nights as a good example there is no one (Gooners and spammers apart) who would have questioned the validity of that goal if it had been awarded. Spending 4 minutes finding a reason to disallow goals is almost bringing the game into disrepute. One other thing refereeing standards in Europe are getting to be as bad as in this country, we have had some awful ones this season and last nights was another who lacked any bottle, time wasting was left completely unchecked (yet again) and no real time was added on for it.
They already use a semi-automated system to do that in the CL. The issue wasn’t judging Kane’s position relative to the ball and other players, it was deciding if the Sporting defender deliberately played the ball or if it was a deflection. If the former, Kane is onside. The latter, which is what they decided happened, and he’s off.
I suggested a plan on the PL board: every VAR intervention gets a 60 second timer counting down. If in that time 3 people working together cannot find a 'clear and obvious' reason to overturn the on pitch decision, that decision by definition isn't 'clearly and obviously' wrong and should therefore stand. I also suggested about a year ago that VAR should be used like challenges in tennis. Each side gets an allocation of 2 or 3 'challenges' per game which they are at liberty to use as they see fit depending on how strong they feel the evidence is in their favour. This would actually increase the excitement in some ways as teams would have to think quickly, decisively but also very carefully before using one of their quota of 'challenges'. It would make games far more intriguing for neutral fans.
If there was a 60s limit the Kane goal would have been definitely disallowed because it was clearly offside. I don't really see why they should not be allowed time to examine various angles to determine whether the defending player deliberately touched or handled the ball. Why is there a rush? Why is speed more important than accuracy. I think there is something different wrong though. Kane wasn't given offside by the on pitch officials so the referee didn't have to make a decision as to whether the defender deliberately played the ball. So surely having discovered Kane was offside that decision should have been referred back to the Referee via the monitor rather than the call being made by the VaR
They would need to get rid of any judgement calls by changing the Offside Law for full automation. Or have a beep in the refs ear so that (s)he was alerted to a player being in an offside position and could then immediately make the judgement call
The challenges idea is interesting but I don't think it should apply to line calls. In tennis they are now in the absurd position that they have the technology to get the calls exactly right but chose instead to have fallible humans getting them wrong and other fallible humans having to guess if they are wrong or not.
