VAR at it again….

[littleyellowbirdie 2,553]

The problem seems mostly to be the questionable decisions about when to use VAR by the referees.

The solution is to change to a challenge system where each manager has 3 VAR challenge 'lives' at the start of the game to invoke a VAR review. A review that goes your way, you don't lose a life; a review where the referee's decision is upheld and you lose a life. When you're down to zero, you can't challenge any further that game.

Edited October 1, 2023 by littleyellowbirdie

[Wacky Waving Inflatable Arm Flailing Tube Man 3,821]

In defence of Hooper (see, I'm defending refs again already!), he had nothing to do with this offside decision. 

The VAR mistakenly thought the on-field decision was to give the goal, so when he saw Diaz was onside, he gave the 'check complete' verdict to Hooper, who obviously then allowed Spurs to take the free kick. 

The VAR, Darren England, is going to be in a lot of trouble.

[Wacky Waving Inflatable Arm Flailing Tube Man 3,821]

7 minutes ago, littleyellowbirdie said:

The problem seems mostly to be the questionable decisions about when to use VAR by the referees.

The solution is to change to a challenge system where each manager has 3 VAR challenge 'lives' at the start of the game to invoke a VAR review. A review that goes your way, you don't lose a life; a review where the referee's decision is upheld and you lose a life. When you're down to zero, you can't challenge any further that game.

But the decisions made will still be the same as you've got the same people making then and using the same parameters. Also, it would probably cause further arguments. 

"That was never a red card. The decision was upheld AND we lose a review!? Especially when another club had one similar overturned last week!?"

It might also cause arguments on the touchline as well. Had Spurs reviewed the Jones yellow which turned to red, Klopp would've kicked off at the Spurs bench, for sure. 

[WD40 720]

It’s a howler from the VAR official not paying attention to the game. But I thought refs are told to give the goal in tight offside goals and let VAR sort it out. So on that guidance Darren England has assumed the pillock Hooper has followed guidance to give the goal and he’s confirming the goal.

[WD40 720]

11 minutes ago, Wacky Waving Inflatable Arm Flailing Tube Man said:

In defence of Hooper (see, I'm defending refs again already!), he had nothing to do with this offside decision. 

The VAR mistakenly thought the on-field decision was to give the goal, so when he saw Diaz was onside, he gave the 'check complete' verdict to Hooper, who obviously then allowed Spurs to take the free kick. 

The VAR, Darren England, is going to be in a lot of trouble.

Disagree. If it’s a tight offside then benefit goes to attacker, don’t call offside on the field and let VAR check. 

[Jim Smith 2,322]

I reiterate. Darren England. Saints away. F**ked us over. No doubt his punishment will be to referee a few championship games! 

[Wacky Waving Inflatable Arm Flailing Tube Man 3,821]

11 minutes ago, WD40 said:

Disagree. If it’s a tight offside then benefit goes to attacker, don’t call offside on the field and let VAR check. 

Hang on, what are you disagreeing with? The rest of your post has nothing to do with anything I said 😂

[The Real Buh 3,444]

When the European superleague splits away the remaining domestic league should operate without VAR to make it a unique product

[Coneys Knee 974]

12 hours ago, percy varco said:

Why does the game continue with a system that has as many flaws as a human only. 

I think we all know the answer to that one I’m afraid.

[Nuff Said 5,146]

13 hours ago, Indy said:

Regardless of the team or how much you might hate them, VAR and officials are now being shown as corrupt and it sours Football!

Corruption is different to incompetence. Surely, according to the views of most on here, if there was corruption, it would be in Liverpool’s favour?

[Indy 3,301]

2 minutes ago, Nuff Said said:

Corruption is different to incompetence. Surely, according to the views of most on here, if there was corruption, it would be in Liverpool’s favour?

No I think the Premier League want a close fight with London clubs involved and spurs have a big following globally. It’s all about money and tv subscription.

[Don’t be Krul 399]

2 hours ago, city4eva said:

I hate Simon Hooper but the offside wasn’t his call…Lino gave it ,VAR didn’t intervene 

He also didn’t give a red until VAR did intervene

 

VAR needs a serious overhaul 

VAR aside, how about Jota's first yellow? Never a yellow in a million years. Hooper is just plain sh!t

[Nuff Said 5,146]

9 hours ago, lake district canary said:

The way technology is used in many walks of life is cringeworthy right across the board. Yes, technology can be a great asset for all sorts of things, but there are also many situations where technology is more problem than it is worth.

VAR is one of those things. Just because technology is clever and can do all sorts of whizzy stuff, if it is set up wrong, or used badly, it can be worse than useless.

From companies that have to use paper and pen back ups because if they don't, they risk losing all their data (happened to an optician group up here recently) to failing technology at places (sports/concerts/railways etc) that rely on e-ticketing with no ability to print a real ticket, which means when the technology doesn't work, everyone is f*ck*d.

On top of the general waste of vast amounts in the name of "progress" and "efficiency" and "technology"......we have to put up with it in watching football, where the incompetence is so rife it would be laughable if it wasn't so sad.

I get that many younger people know nothing else - they can't remember a time when there was little computer technology around, but surely to goodness there must be enough people of all ages that can see it is not the answer to everything?  VAR is ruining football - maybe the technology is clever, but if the numpties that are in charge of it can't use it properly, there is really no point in it at all.

Where shall I start?

To the best of my knowledge, *no-one* thinks technology is the answer to everything. There are 33 million people in the UK paid to do jobs which presumably they do better than a technological solution. 
 

Secondly, almost all examples of technology replacing some sort of manual process are because it *is* more efficient. Cherry picking a tiny number of examples where it doesn’t work quite right doesn’t prove anything. 
 

On the “pen and paper” backup (almost no-one does this, they will backup their data, have secondary systems etc.). One of the basic rules of implementing technology properly is that technology breaks and you need a plan on how you cope with that - or you acknowledge that you can manage without it in the time it is likely to take to recover it. If you don’t assess risk properly, you’re doing it wrong.

 

On VAR in particular, it’s not what they are doing, the issue is how they are doing it. It feels like a failure to define objectives and process properly, and then a reluctance to ignore the “sunk cost” and reassess the whole thing.

[littleyellowbirdie 2,553]

1 hour ago, Wacky Waving Inflatable Arm Flailing Tube Man said:

But the decisions made will still be the same as you've got the same people making then and using the same parameters. Also, it would probably cause further arguments. 

"That was never a red card. The decision was upheld AND we lose a review!? Especially when another club had one similar overturned last week!?"

It might also cause arguments on the touchline as well. Had Spurs reviewed the Jones yellow which turned to red, Klopp would've kicked off at the Spurs bench, for sure. 

VAR can't get rid of the fact that there will always be a degree of judgement and interpretation by the officials. What it does is ensure that they have access to all the information in making a judgement. If most people object to the outcomes then that's a failure of the adjudication and the text of the rules, not the surveillance system,

Arguments on the touchline are easy to deal with. If it's a rule that each manager has the right to challenge, they challenge and win, and the other manager kicks off then the disruptive manager gets sent off. The best thing about VAR is it puts the spotlight on the rules and processes instead of whether the referee happened to see something or not.

Edited October 1, 2023 by littleyellowbirdie

[hogesar 9,677]

1 hour ago, Wacky Waving Inflatable Arm Flailing Tube Man said:

In defence of Hooper (see, I'm defending refs again already!), he had nothing to do with this offside decision. 

The VAR mistakenly thought the on-field decision was to give the goal, so when he saw Diaz was onside, he gave the 'check complete' verdict to Hooper, who obviously then allowed Spurs to take the free kick. 

The VAR, Darren England, is going to be in a lot of trouble.

Ah, Darren! The referee who got so much wrong in our game vs Southampton is trusted with Prem VAR and gets that horrifically wrong.

Its almost like these guys who are terrible at their job continue to be even with the help of technology. 

I genuinely believe the PGMOL realise they have a set of very, very poor standard referees compared to other countries and thought VAR was their get out - yet there's problems every week.

[Wacky Waving Inflatable Arm Flailing Tube Man 3,821]

2 minutes ago, littleyellowbirdie said:

VAR can't get rid of the fact that there will always be a degree of judgement and interpretation by the officials. What it does is ensure that they have access to all the information in making a judgement. If most people object to the outcomes then that's a failure of the adjudication and the text of the rules, not the surveillance system,

Arguments on the touchline are easy to deal with. If it's a rule that each manager has the right to challenge, they challenge and win, and the other manager kicks off then the disruptive manager gets sent off.

But if a team challenges a decision that is not overturned, let's say one like the penalty not given to Wolves on the opening weekend, it becomes even worse. Not only is the penalty not given (and I don't think the VAR is more or less likely to change a decision if it comes from an appeal rather than the current system) then the team loses a review as well, and it will cause managers, fans and pundits to be even more disgruntled. 

I'm against a review-based VAR decision system for that reason. It over-complicates it and will cause the disagreements, controversy and bad feeling over supposed 'wrong' decisions to amplify. Especially when most decisions in football are subjective, compared to tennis, for example, where they're all matter-of-fact. But then again, we all thought offside decisions were matter-of-fact until yesterday, didn't we!?

Also, let's take Romero's 'handball' against Arsenal last Sunday. That was a borderline call which split the pundits. Had Arsenal reviewed that and it wasn't given, they'd have been furious, even more so had they reviewed it and lost an appeal. Had that been given on the pitch and Spurs reviewed it, they'd have been furious had it not been overturned. The fact that a team had lost or wasted a review on something so subjective will leave an even more bitter taste in the mouth. In cricket you have 'umpire's call' whereby a review that was close doesn't count as lost if the decision is not overturned. There can be no such thing with a subjective decision, so you're just going to cause more arguments than we have now. 

[Wacky Waving Inflatable Arm Flailing Tube Man 3,821]

7 minutes ago, hogesar said:

I genuinely believe the PGMOL realise they have a set of very, very poor standard referees compared to other countries and thought VAR was their get out - yet there's problems every week.

Every country in Europe thinks they have the worst officials, though. It really is no better on the continent when you look at the stuff that goes on.

And the reason for that is because, as I've said before, the vast majority of decisions are subjective. There are numerous calls in every match where one team will be furious if the decision goes one way, and the opposition will be furious if it goes the other. 

The best we can ask for is that the 'shockers' get eliminated, and 99% of them have been. Yesterday's against Liverpool is one that slipped through the net, obviously.

Edited October 1, 2023 by Wacky Waving Inflatable Arm Flailing Tube Man

[littleyellowbirdie 2,553]

14 minutes ago, Wacky Waving Inflatable Arm Flailing Tube Man said:

But if a team challenges a decision that is not overturned, let's say one like the penalty not given to Wolves on the opening weekend, it becomes even worse. Not only is the penalty not given (and I don't think the VAR is more or less likely to change a decision if it comes from an appeal rather than the current system) then the team loses a review as well, and it will cause managers, fans and pundits to be even more disgruntled. 

 

No reason why it should. In the VAR process, everybody can see that the event has been reviewed with great precision. There can be no illusion that anyone has made a mistake over what happened. That therefore only leaves commentary about the referee's interpretation and whether it's consistent with the rules, and whether the rules themselves are fit for purpose.There's nothing to be disgruntled about as far as the review process is concerned, especially compared to the haphazard approach of simply relying on whether the referee had a good view at the time when something  happened.

As it stands, the only thing that seems haphazard about VAR is whether they bother to refer to it at all in any given situation. That's why I think putting it in the hands of the managers to challenge, like tennis, is the best way to address that.

You're right: It won't stop fans and teams moaning anyway if things don't go their way, but nothing will do that.

Most major sports have implemented some form of video adjudication, most have had teething troubles, and most have solved those problems now because they were far quicker to embrace the technology in the first place. Football is simply behind the curve because it started later.It will ultimately have to be made to work properly in a way that people have confidence in, because there's no going back.

Edited October 1, 2023 by littleyellowbirdie

[Wacky Waving Inflatable Arm Flailing Tube Man 3,821]

4 minutes ago, littleyellowbirdie said:

No reason why it should. In the VAR process, everybody can see that the event has been reviewed with great precision. There can be no illusion that anyone has made a mistake over what happened. That therefore only leaves commentary about the referee's interpretation and whether it's consistent with the rules, and whether the rules themselves are fit for purpose.There's nothing to be disgruntled about as far as the review process is concerned, especially compared to the haphazard approach of simply relying on whether the referee had a good view at the time when something  happened.

You're right: It won't stop fans and teams moaning anyway if things don't go their way, but nothing will do that.

But every decision now is already reviewed with that level of precision which you outline. Ultimately, it comes down to one person's decision, and every now and again the media, fans etc. almost unanimously agree that it was wrong. A review-based system would not change that, or improve the rate of correct decisions.

You'll never stop fans and coaches moaning, but you can make them moan more. And if they lose a review when a bad VAR decision goes against them, it will definitely make them moan more. It would make a controversial system even more controversial and would not decrease the amount of 'wrong' decisions because the exact same decision-making process would be followed as it is now. 

[Nuff Said 5,146]

9 minutes ago, Wacky Waving Inflatable Arm Flailing Tube Man said:

Every country in Europe thinks they have the worst officials, though. It really is no better on the continent when you look at the stuff that goes on.

And the reason for that is because, as I've said before, the vast majority of decisions are subjective. There are numerous calls in every match where one team will be furious if the decision goes one way, and the opposition will be furious if it goes the other. 

The best we can ask for is that the 'shockers' get eliminated, and 99% of them have been. Yesterday's against Liverpool is one that slipped through the net, obviously.

Exactly. The question we should be asking is has VAR on the whole made things better? TBH I can’t answer that as I pay very little attention to football unless it involves NCFC. But forensically analysing the times it goes wrong is missing the wider point.

For me, a reset so VAR really is about “clear and obvious” errors and those only would fix most of the issues. If we’re looking at a hairs’s breadth offside decision, you always go with the officials on the pitch. 

[littleyellowbirdie 2,553]

2 minutes ago, Wacky Waving Inflatable Arm Flailing Tube Man said:

But every decision now is already reviewed with that level of precision which you outline. Ultimately, it comes down to one person's decision, and every now and again the media, fans etc. almost unanimously agree that it was wrong. A review-based system would not change that, or improve the rate of correct decisions.

 

Exactly: VAR is not the problem. The rules, and the quality and consitency of interpretation of the rules are the problem. And the adoption of VAR has highlighted that that is the problem in a way that could never happen when referees had the benefit of the doubt as to whether they may or may not have seen something.

Edited October 1, 2023 by littleyellowbirdie

[littleyellowbirdie 2,553]

6 minutes ago, Nuff Said said:

Exactly. The question we should be asking is has VAR on the whole made things better? TBH I can’t answer that as I pay very little attention to football unless it involves NCFC. But forensically analysing the times it goes wrong is missing the wider point.

For me, a reset so VAR really is about “clear and obvious” errors and those only would fix most of the issues. If we’re looking at a hairs’s breadth offside decision, you always go with the officials on the pitch. 

I think this is okay in the way it's only at the discretion of the referees as to whether VAR is invoked, but if the managers are invoking VAR then it has to be considered like an appeal process as in tennis, so if the event is on the right side or the wrong side of the rules by the tiniest margin, then that's the way it would have to go, regardless of the referee's initial decision on-pitch.

Edited October 1, 2023 by littleyellowbirdie

[essex canary 496]

Seeing it in action in Spain it is often a long drawn out process. We don't like that which is why in the UK we are trying to rush. That is another factor in what happened yesterday. 

Too many cooks spoil the broth.

If VAR is to be good it urgently needs a rethink. The offside rule ditto in the sense that the old logic of seeking to gain an advantage should be paramount.

[Wacky Waving Inflatable Arm Flailing Tube Man 3,821]

13 minutes ago, Nuff Said said:

Exactly. The question we should be asking is has VAR on the whole made things better? 

I'd say yes. 

I saw a video a couple of years ago (which I just tried to search on YouTube but couldn't find) which highlighted the worst pre-VAR refereeing decisions in Premier League history. 

It featured Kieran Gibbs being sent off for Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain's handball, Pedro Mendes' lob that was closer to the back of the net than the goalline but not given, and Sam Vokes punching the ball at an attacking corner but being awarded a penalty because the ref thought it was a defender's arm. 

These decisions were absolutely incredible, and obviously won't happen now because we have VAR.

Decisions which are borderline, and will definitely infuriate the team who has the decision given against them? They happened before VAR and they still happen now. They caused arguments before, and they cause arguments now. Will you ever be able to stop that? Not a chance, with or without VAR.

The best you can hope for is that the decisions which are clearly ridiculous are eliminated. And barring extremely rare examples, such as the Diaz goal yesterday, they have been. 

[city4eva 213]

1 hour ago, Don’t be Krul said:

VAR aside, how about Jota's first yellow? Never a yellow in a million years. Hooper is just plain sh!t

Agreed it wasn’t a yellow 

 

 

[Trevor Hockey's Beard 527]

VAR needs a complete reset. The whole industry needs to get around a screen and agree how VAR is used, and how VAR decisions are reached

I believe that the cameras used for offside decisions need to take more shots per second, to increase the accuracy of photographs. The players all wear the technology to map their movement around the pitch. How about revising the offside rule so that it relates to the centre of the player's torso and use this location data.

Hooper was only shown the still shot of Jones' boot impacting the Spurs player's leg, which looked terrible, but the whole sequence shows how his foot slipped off the top of the ball - it was an accident, it was not deliberate and not malicious - so yes give Jones a yellow for not being in full control of his movements, but don't upgrade it to a red. Hooper had no choice, because the decision was made for him. This reminds me of when Emi was sent off against Burnley at home - the ref was only shown the footage of Emi's revenge on Tarkowski (?) and not the violent provocation beforehand, which probably should have seen them both sent off.

[nutty nigel 7,539]

I don’t t see these games so couldn’t really care less how many times VAR ducks up. It seems to me that it’s a great addition for the TV audience as they watch the replays and discuss the merits of each decision and intervention. Whenever I see MOTD they also devote a large amount of time discussing it. I guess it’s good entertainment.

But in the stadium it is just awful. Supporters can no longer fully celebrate goals and minutes later, even if the goal stands, that celebratory moment is lost.

Reading this thread it seems like errors are commonplace so what’s the ducking point?

[mrD66M 99]

Liverpool got done yesterday, but that was karmic retribution, they have gotten away with it many times.

Way I saw it, the Diaz goal was 100% onside and should've stood. The 1st sending off, even though Jones gets the ball, the follow through is out of control and could have resulted in serious injury. Jota 1st yellow should have been withdrawn - whether it is a foul at all I'm not sure as Udogie's foot touches Jota's knee behind him, causing the trip. But once he gets that yellow, Jota can have no complaints about the 2nd.

[keelansgrandad 6,679]

I have only just seen the incident. And I am laughing. All these top clubs, coaches, players and pundits have pleaded for technology to decide for many years. They have had it for a while now and there are just as many moans, groans, accusations of corruption or incompetence as there were without it.

They have turned the EPL into a joke. I haven't heard any of them asking foor it to be abolished. They scream for it to be better. But it can't be. Even the offside element is still being criticised even though yesterday showed that its not infallible, although it is accurate.

But fouls or handballs still depend on a judgement. And we can't expect each VAR person to agree on what the parameter for a push or pull is.

They are welcome to their plight. They make me laugh and vomit at the same time. You cannot cheat  and flaunt the rules and then demand they be implemented when it suits.

And its just another illustration of how the supporters are viewed. A financial means to an end.

[Herman 9,780]

This smells a bit.

 

Edited October 1, 2023 by Herman