Video technology

[Rethinking the future 0]

I have never been won over by the arguments for video technology but having watched the excellent tennis match with Andrew Murray today, I am beginning to change my mind.

Within the tennis match, each player was allowed to make 2 appeals per set for computer technology to be used to judge contested line calls. The results were very quick (approx 10 seconds) and had little disruption to the flow of the game.

In football, I can see no reason why each team should not be allowed to make 1 contested judgement per game (or per half) to be evaluated by computer. But to make this clear, this would only apply to issues regarding the movement of the ball, so would cover goal disputes and offsides. It would not cover fouls and tackles.

The biggest problem with technology is that the accuracy can kill the game as a sport. In my opinion, half the attraction is that the officials have a split second to make a decision and throughout every game, they will make mistakes. Sometimes they will go in your favour, sometimes not. It''s all part of the game.

With the role of president up for grabs at UEFA in a few weeks, I wonder how long this debate will come back to the discussion boards.