To me that looks like his knee is clearly behind the red dotted line they’ve drawn from his shoulder.
Which would mean that’s the part they’ve focused on to make the ruling.
Refs & VAR 2020/2021 Discussion
- Thread starter Annihilate Now!
- Start date
To me that looks like his knee is clearly behind the red dotted line they’ve drawn from his shoulder.
Which would mean that’s the part they’ve focused on to make the ruling.
Blame who you want, VAR, the incompetent refs, the law makers, but this has to fecking change. All 3 of these today are absolutely ridiculous.
First Fulham's disallowed goal. I'm fuming and I don't give a feck about Fulham. This is absolutely being robbed. His arm is in a natural position, next to his body. You're a fecking idiot if you think this is handball, ever. Horrendous decision.
Then the ball hitting Kante's hand. I mean... how the feck isn't this a pen? We all hate Liverpool so it's funny but come on. His hand is way out next to his head and stops a cross from coming in. It's blatant. Made especially more ridiculous that the above was handball and this wasn't
Lastly, the offside. Yeah they've been calling them since last season. Plain and simple for me, if you have to start drawing lines like this, it's not offside. This isn't football. Let alone talking about how they just start picking random parts on his arm until it gets called offside if they pre-determined they'll call it offside. It's fecked. You can bet your ass they would call it a handball if the ball struck him where they drew the line.
It's out of control and it's killing the game. VAR is a good idea, if executed properly. Problem is the ref's are idiots, have 0 common sense, don't know the rules, the people who make the rules are shit at making them, and then VAR just exposes all the incompetency by showing multiple replays and the refs fecking up more and more.
I genuinely do miss the days before VAR. Yes, the ref sometimes fecked you. Guess what, football is a game between 2 teams and the selected official to rule the game to the best of their ability. Everyone on the pitch is doing their best. Sometimes you don't get the rub of the green, other times you do. It was a talking point for a bit, and then people would just move on. People could swallow mistakes as it was human error (well of course there would need to be accountability for mistakes from refs and improving the standard). People can't swallow mistakes when you make even more ridiculous decisions after looking at the replays. There are no excuses to feck up like they do. Bring back the days before VAR where we would be occasionally pissed off at the ref but were able to celebrate goals normally. It's so refreshing to look at older highlights pre-VAR and see a goal happen, and there not be any sort of delay while refs investigated every minute detail for a possible irrelevant nudge or nick of a hand somewhere in the past minute of game time. I fear those days are gone for good though, and for the worse.
First Fulham's disallowed goal. I'm fuming and I don't give a feck about Fulham. This is absolutely being robbed. His arm is in a natural position, next to his body. You're a fecking idiot if you think this is handball, ever. Horrendous decision.
Then the ball hitting Kante's hand. I mean... how the feck isn't this a pen? We all hate Liverpool so it's funny but come on. His hand is way out next to his head and stops a cross from coming in. It's blatant. Made especially more ridiculous that the above was handball and this wasn't
Lastly, the offside. Yeah they've been calling them since last season. Plain and simple for me, if you have to start drawing lines like this, it's not offside. This isn't football. Let alone talking about how they just start picking random parts on his arm until it gets called offside if they pre-determined they'll call it offside. It's fecked. You can bet your ass they would call it a handball if the ball struck him where they drew the line.
It's out of control and it's killing the game. VAR is a good idea, if executed properly. Problem is the ref's are idiots, have 0 common sense, don't know the rules, the people who make the rules are shit at making them, and then VAR just exposes all the incompetency by showing multiple replays and the refs fecking up more and more.
I genuinely do miss the days before VAR. Yes, the ref sometimes fecked you. Guess what, football is a game between 2 teams and the selected official to rule the game to the best of their ability. Everyone on the pitch is doing their best. Sometimes you don't get the rub of the green, other times you do. It was a talking point for a bit, and then people would just move on. People could swallow mistakes as it was human error (well of course there would need to be accountability for mistakes from refs and improving the standard). People can't swallow mistakes when you make even more ridiculous decisions after looking at the replays. There are no excuses to feck up like they do. Bring back the days before VAR where we would be occasionally pissed off at the ref but were able to celebrate goals normally. It's so refreshing to look at older highlights pre-VAR and see a goal happen, and there not be any sort of delay while refs investigated every minute detail for a possible irrelevant nudge or nick of a hand somewhere in the past minute of game time. I fear those days are gone for good though, and for the worse.
Liverpool and Spurs getting favourable VAR decisions? Plus ca change.
They now focus on the cuff of a short sleeve shirt meaning you can score a goal from that part of the body.
To be fair Liverpool should of had a penalty when Kante decided to become Chelseas new GK
I really don't think those decisions had anything to do with it being Liverpool and Spurs. Not like Liverpool haven't already had plenty of VAR calls go against them this season.
It's just shite rules that could go for/against anyone on any given day.
It's just shite rules that could go for/against anyone on any given day.
Bold bit is irrelevant. Always been a different rule for attackers.
I don't know why people are so perplexed about that one, but for 'wanting' to be angry about it. Lino probably would have flagged it without VAR tbh.
Blame who you want, VAR, the incompetent refs, the law makers, but this has to fecking change. All 3 of these today are absolutely ridiculous.
First Fulham's disallowed goal. I'm fuming and I don't give a feck about Fulham. This is absolutely being robbed. His arm is in a natural position, next to his body. You're a fecking idiot if you think this is handball, ever. Horrendous decision.
Then the ball hitting Kante's hand. I mean... how the feck isn't this a pen? We all hate Liverpool so it's funny but come on. His hand is way out next to his head and stops a cross from coming in. It's blatant. Made especially more ridiculous that the above was handball and this wasn't
Lastly, the offside. Yeah they've been calling them since last season. Plain and simple for me, if you have to start drawing lines like this, it's not offside. This isn't football. Let alone talking about how they just start picking random parts on his arm until it gets called offside if they pre-determined they'll call it offside. It's fecked. You can bet your ass they would call it a handball if the ball struck him where they drew the line.
It's out of control and it's killing the game. VAR is a good idea, if executed properly. Problem is the ref's are idiots, have 0 common sense, don't know the rules, the people who make the rules are shit at making them, and then VAR just exposes all the incompetency by showing multiple replays and the refs fecking up more and more.
I genuinely do miss the days before VAR. Yes, the ref sometimes fecked you. Guess what, football is a game between 2 teams and the selected official to rule the game to the best of their ability. Everyone on the pitch is doing their best. Sometimes you don't get the rub of the green, other times you do. It was a talking point for a bit, and then people would just move on. People could swallow mistakes as it was human error (well of course there would need to be accountability for mistakes from refs and improving the standard). People can't swallow mistakes when you make even more ridiculous decisions after looking at the replays. There are no excuses to feck up like they do. Bring back the days before VAR where we would be occasionally pissed off at the ref but were able to celebrate goals normally. It's so refreshing to look at older highlights pre-VAR and see a goal happen, and there not be any sort of delay while refs investigated every minute detail for a possible irrelevant nudge or nick of a hand somewhere in the past minute of game time. I fear those days are gone for good though, and for the worse.
Absolutely spot on from start to finish.
I keep banging on about this but the solution is to just get rid of slow motion and freeze frames with VAR. Have another ref watching at normal speed only, if he thinks there's an issue he calls the on-pitch ref over to a screen where he sees the same thing at normal speed. You reduce delays, you eliminate margin of error in terms of framerate, players can celebrate goals because the lineos have authority again, and you do away with the utter bullshit of line drawing. People want VAR to overturn the egregiously bad decisions, not to decide whether someone's fecking armpit is offside or if the ball has grazed a fingernail.
Fascinating how Chelsea get off the hook on a blatant handball penalty, called by VAR and messed up by the ref, who gets criticized by every competent commentator, and next game the same happens - did the ref learn from the fuss and call it? No, VAR learned and pushed it under the rug.
It's not irrelevant at all. Where do you want his arm to be? It's literally down by his side, and the ball would have hit his side if his arm wasn't there and there would be no change. It's against his body. He doesn't move his arm to the ball to direct it. It just hits his arm, in a neutral position, down by his side not making his frame of contact any bigger. It's NEVER a handball. It's a ridiculous call.
In terms of what should handball be, I always like looking at it like "what would happen if the hand wasn't there" (for most things). If the hand is in front of your face and it blocks the ball hitting your face, it shouldn't be a handball. If your arm is away from your body and flailing like Kante's, the ball gets past and it's a normal cross and a chance for a goal. If Hudson Odoi's hand doesn't push the ball even slightly last week, it stays with Greenwood to control a bit more normally. The hand was away from the body there. If your hand is by your side, what else are you supposed to do with it? That Fulham call is genuinely one of the worst hand ball calls I've seen since VAR came into play, and that just can't be a rule in football. It just can't.
Yeah, I don't think there's any bias. I think the refs love being the center of attention with VAR and love being nit-picky about every tiny little detail now, combined with being garbage referees. I also think there is evidently absolutely no accountability on refs, as the same shite refs can repeat the same shite performances, year after year with no change. I think the refs get affected by "momentum" or "story lines" too much as well. A red card foul in the first minute being "harsh" for example.
Blame who you want, VAR, the incompetent refs, the law makers, but this has to fecking change. All 3 of these today are absolutely ridiculous.
First Fulham's disallowed goal. I'm fuming and I don't give a feck about Fulham. This is absolutely being robbed. His arm is in a natural position, next to his body. You're a fecking idiot if you think this is handball, ever. Horrendous decision.
Then the ball hitting Kante's hand. I mean... how the feck isn't this a pen? We all hate Liverpool so it's funny but come on. His hand is way out next to his head and stops a cross from coming in. It's blatant. Made especially more ridiculous that the above was handball and this wasn't
Lastly, the offside. Yeah they've been calling them since last season. Plain and simple for me, if you have to start drawing lines like this, it's not offside. This isn't football. Let alone talking about how they just start picking random parts on his arm until it gets called offside if they pre-determined they'll call it offside. It's fecked. You can bet your ass they would call it a handball if the ball struck him where they drew the line.
It's out of control and it's killing the game. VAR is a good idea, if executed properly. Problem is the ref's are idiots, have 0 common sense, don't know the rules, the people who make the rules are shit at making them, and then VAR just exposes all the incompetency by showing multiple replays and the refs fecking up more and more.
I genuinely do miss the days before VAR. Yes, the ref sometimes fecked you. Guess what, football is a game between 2 teams and the selected official to rule the game to the best of their ability. Everyone on the pitch is doing their best. Sometimes you don't get the rub of the green, other times you do. It was a talking point for a bit, and then people would just move on. People could swallow mistakes as it was human error (well of course there would need to be accountability for mistakes from refs and improving the standard). People can't swallow mistakes when you make even more ridiculous decisions after looking at the replays. There are no excuses to feck up like they do. Bring back the days before VAR where we would be occasionally pissed off at the ref but were able to celebrate goals normally. It's so refreshing to look at older highlights pre-VAR and see a goal happen, and there not be any sort of delay while refs investigated every minute detail for a possible irrelevant nudge or nick of a hand somewhere in the past minute of game time. I fear those days are gone for good though, and for the worse.
Well said mate. I'm gutted
yep - as soon as the onus is on the ref, they shit themselves in case Jamesie fecking Redknapp or RedNev disagree. Trouble is, var areputting the ball back into thr refs court instead of making a decision themselves
the Fulham one was a fecking joke.
Really think this shite will impact on gate numbers.
Really think this shite will impact on gate numbers.
Blame who you want, VAR, the incompetent refs, the law makers, but this has to fecking change. All 3 of these today are absolutely ridiculous.
First Fulham's disallowed goal. I'm fuming and I don't give a feck about Fulham. This is absolutely being robbed. His arm is in a natural position, next to his body. You're a fecking idiot if you think this is handball, ever. Horrendous decision.
Then the ball hitting Kante's hand. I mean... how the feck isn't this a pen? We all hate Liverpool so it's funny but come on. His hand is way out next to his head and stops a cross from coming in. It's blatant. Made especially more ridiculous that the above was handball and this wasn't
Lastly, the offside. Yeah they've been calling them since last season. Plain and simple for me, if you have to start drawing lines like this, it's not offside. This isn't football. Let alone talking about how they just start picking random parts on his arm until it gets called offside if they pre-determined they'll call it offside. It's fecked. You can bet your ass they would call it a handball if the ball struck him where they drew the line.
It's out of control and it's killing the game. VAR is a good idea, if executed properly. Problem is the ref's are idiots, have 0 common sense, don't know the rules, the people who make the rules are shit at making them, and then VAR just exposes all the incompetency by showing multiple replays and the refs fecking up more and more.
I genuinely do miss the days before VAR. Yes, the ref sometimes fecked you. Guess what, football is a game between 2 teams and the selected official to rule the game to the best of their ability. Everyone on the pitch is doing their best. Sometimes you don't get the rub of the green, other times you do. It was a talking point for a bit, and then people would just move on. People could swallow mistakes as it was human error (well of course there would need to be accountability for mistakes from refs and improving the standard). People can't swallow mistakes when you make even more ridiculous decisions after looking at the replays. There are no excuses to feck up like they do. Bring back the days before VAR where we would be occasionally pissed off at the ref but were able to celebrate goals normally. It's so refreshing to look at older highlights pre-VAR and see a goal happen, and there not be any sort of delay while refs investigated every minute detail for a possible irrelevant nudge or nick of a hand somewhere in the past minute of game time. I fear those days are gone for good though, and for the worse.
Fulham one wasn't a horrendous decision, those are the rules. Blame Fifa or whoever it is in charge of the laws of the game.
Kante one for me not a penalty,, gets smashed at his hand from two yards away and isn't particularly extended away from his body. That's the kind of nonsense handball that was being given at the start of the season.
Nah, that poster is right: it is irrelevant. I've posted it 47 times tonight it feels like, so sorry for the repetition everyone, but it does not matter if it is deliberate or not if the ball touches a players arm directly before they either set up or score a goal. Even an accidental handball, in those circumstances, sees the goal chalked off.
It's a stupid rule, but it is the rule and has been for a couple of years now
Well it is, as there's no context for any of that in the rules. Hits an attackers arm = instantly handball. No ifs/buts.
Beyond that, if there were grey areas then you'd have Maradona or Henry style incidents being 'grey areas'. No thanks - got enough of them in the rules as it is, and it's them ruining it
Blame who you want, VAR, the incompetent refs, the law makers, but this has to fecking change. All 3 of these today are absolutely ridiculous.
First Fulham's disallowed goal. I'm fuming and I don't give a feck about Fulham. This is absolutely being robbed. His arm is in a natural position, next to his body. You're a fecking idiot if you think this is handball, ever. Horrendous decision.
Then the ball hitting Kante's hand. I mean... how the feck isn't this a pen? We all hate Liverpool so it's funny but come on. His hand is way out next to his head and stops a cross from coming in. It's blatant. Made especially more ridiculous that the above was handball and this wasn't
Lastly, the offside. Yeah they've been calling them since last season. Plain and simple for me, if you have to start drawing lines like this, it's not offside. This isn't football. Let alone talking about how they just start picking random parts on his arm until it gets called offside if they pre-determined they'll call it offside. It's fecked. You can bet your ass they would call it a handball if the ball struck him where they drew the line.
It's out of control and it's killing the game. VAR is a good idea, if executed properly. Problem is the ref's are idiots, have 0 common sense, don't know the rules, the people who make the rules are shit at making them, and then VAR just exposes all the incompetency by showing multiple replays and the refs fecking up more and more.
I genuinely do miss the days before VAR. Yes, the ref sometimes fecked you. Guess what, football is a game between 2 teams and the selected official to rule the game to the best of their ability. Everyone on the pitch is doing their best. Sometimes you don't get the rub of the green, other times you do. It was a talking point for a bit, and then people would just move on. People could swallow mistakes as it was human error (well of course there would need to be accountability for mistakes from refs and improving the standard). People can't swallow mistakes when you make even more ridiculous decisions after looking at the replays. There are no excuses to feck up like they do. Bring back the days before VAR where we would be occasionally pissed off at the ref but were able to celebrate goals normally. It's so refreshing to look at older highlights pre-VAR and see a goal happen, and there not be any sort of delay while refs investigated every minute detail for a possible irrelevant nudge or nick of a hand somewhere in the past minute of game time. I fear those days are gone for good though, and for the worse.
Great post. I agreed with the idea of VAR, but its implementation has been disgraceful. It has really destroyed the game.
If you have to spend minutes drawing lines it's not offside. If there is no daylight between the lines, it's not offside. I'd be shaving my pubes before every game. I'd hate to have a goal disallowed because I had a big wirey one playing me offside.
Don't think its right allowing goals off the arm at the point they call it. Shoulder is fair anything lower no. But by current rules, stupid but justified offside. But that goes both ways for attack too. Maybe they should have all teams have to have a color band on their arm for the full team for offside calls, which goes for and against them (otherwise attackers would love ones way down and defenders way up).
What happens if, for example, Maguire accidentally handles the ball in his own penalty area, brings it down and plays the ball over the opposition defence for Rashford to score on the counter within seconds of the original incident? Do United concede a penalty just because Rushford has managed to score?
My point is that there shouldn't be a different rule depending on whether a team is deemed to be attacking or defending. This hypothetical situation in the my opening paragraph might seem unlikely but so was the Shaw incident vs Burnley and the Silva goal vs Villa. These are situations where we should know what the outcome will be before they occur, but the rules are unnecessarily vague and refs aren't trained to a high enough standard so they just make it up as they go. VAR has just highlighted what an unfair game football is and how referees consistently manage to have a bigger influence than any single player can have on a game.
The more I watch, the more I realise that the lawmakers and the refs are totally inept. I never thought I'd prefer watching cricket or basketball over the game I adored as a kid, but at least those sports make an effort to adhere to a consistent set of rules even if they don't manage to get every decision right.
The whole thing feels mis-sold. We were told it would be non-intrusive and would rule out incidents such as the Henry handball and famous historic footballing injustices. Turns out what it actually does is ensure that a player with a decent erection needs to be about half a foot behind the last defender or his goal will be disallowed. Goals that before even the most ardent fan, Fany McFanFace, wouldn't object to being given against his team as the opposition player was onside to the naked eye, are now being ruled out because of the way the wind catches the sleeve of the attacking player in the particular freeze-frame of choice therefore ruling out the goal several minutes of delay and having to listen to Jermaine Jenas fill time.
Embarrassingly for the hardcore proponents they have no shame of now pretending that's exactly what they wanted.
"I for one am delighted finally there's a system in place to stop all these egregious goals being scored when clearly the player's eyelashes are offside"
Don't give me 'teething problems' or think you can say "other countries don't have a problem with it" as if nobody is able to use Google to see the routine world-wide shit-show VAR dishes up. Personally I think it's very fortunate to exist at this time when fans aren't allowed in stadiums.
Embarrassingly for the hardcore proponents they have no shame of now pretending that's exactly what they wanted.
"I for one am delighted finally there's a system in place to stop all these egregious goals being scored when clearly the player's eyelashes are offside"
Don't give me 'teething problems' or think you can say "other countries don't have a problem with it" as if nobody is able to use Google to see the routine world-wide shit-show VAR dishes up. Personally I think it's very fortunate to exist at this time when fans aren't allowed in stadiums.
It seems every single time I watch a VAR review I end up disagreeing with the “interpretation”. If any handling of the ball (regardless of context) is supposed to be whistled and deemed a foul by the laws of the game, it needs to be consistent. If Fulham’s goal today was chalked off for handball, Kante’s (and Hudson-Odoi’s) need to be considered handballs too.
The goal is consistency from match to match. Whether the reviews are more strict (frequently overturn decisions on the field) or more lenient (rely more on the original call on the field) is irrelevant. They changed the utilization of the technology mid-season and it just gets worse and worse.
What on earth is this going to look like when the fans return? All of Anfield sees Kante’s handball, the ref gets the feedback in his headset that he needs to take a second look, he stops play for several minutes, the entire stadium sees the handball on the screen from multiple angles, and the ref just says “nah, play on”.
The goal is consistency from match to match. Whether the reviews are more strict (frequently overturn decisions on the field) or more lenient (rely more on the original call on the field) is irrelevant. They changed the utilization of the technology mid-season and it just gets worse and worse.
What on earth is this going to look like when the fans return? All of Anfield sees Kante’s handball, the ref gets the feedback in his headset that he needs to take a second look, he stops play for several minutes, the entire stadium sees the handball on the screen from multiple angles, and the ref just says “nah, play on”.
No. At risk of being the lucky 1000000th person to point it out, they are different rules.
Fulham's goal was a 'handball' by an 'attacking' team - the other two were by the 'defending' team. There are valid logical reasons why the two should be distinct.
Also (again) - the Fulham/attacker one isn't "interpretation" - it's a clear cut rule with no room for "interpretation".
Blame who you want, VAR, the incompetent refs, the law makers, but this has to fecking change. All 3 of these today are absolutely ridiculous.
First Fulham's disallowed goal. I'm fuming and I don't give a feck about Fulham. This is absolutely being robbed. His arm is in a natural position, next to his body. You're a fecking idiot if you think this is handball, ever. Horrendous decision.
Then the ball hitting Kante's hand. I mean... how the feck isn't this a pen? We all hate Liverpool so it's funny but come on. His hand is way out next to his head and stops a cross from coming in. It's blatant. Made especially more ridiculous that the above was handball and this wasn't
Lastly, the offside. Yeah they've been calling them since last season. Plain and simple for me, if you have to start drawing lines like this, it's not offside. This isn't football. Let alone talking about how they just start picking random parts on his arm until it gets called offside if they pre-determined they'll call it offside. It's fecked. You can bet your ass they would call it a handball if the ball struck him where they drew the line.
It's out of control and it's killing the game. VAR is a good idea, if executed properly. Problem is the ref's are idiots, have 0 common sense, don't know the rules, the people who make the rules are shit at making them, and then VAR just exposes all the incompetency by showing multiple replays and the refs fecking up more and more.
I genuinely do miss the days before VAR. Yes, the ref sometimes fecked you. Guess what, football is a game between 2 teams and the selected official to rule the game to the best of their ability. Everyone on the pitch is doing their best. Sometimes you don't get the rub of the green, other times you do. It was a talking point for a bit, and then people would just move on. People could swallow mistakes as it was human error (well of course there would need to be accountability for mistakes from refs and improving the standard). People can't swallow mistakes when you make even more ridiculous decisions after looking at the replays. There are no excuses to feck up like they do. Bring back the days before VAR where we would be occasionally pissed off at the ref but were able to celebrate goals normally. It's so refreshing to look at older highlights pre-VAR and see a goal happen, and there not be any sort of delay while refs investigated every minute detail for a possible irrelevant nudge or nick of a hand somewhere in the past minute of game time. I fear those days are gone for good though, and for the worse.
What is really being highlighted is the incompatibility between rules which have been built up to be purposely open to interpretation for so many years, because referees are human, and VAR technology which allows almost complete accuracy.
The rules are open to interpretation because a human referee can't see for absolute certain what happened and he needs a bit of flexibility and leeway to make the call. If you have a technology that allows you to see exactly what happened, you need to have rules which describe exactly what to do too. It's either offside or it's not, it's a handball or it's not. You can't pair flexible rules with an inflexible system.
Offsides are the only things that are being done correctly imo. Like it or not, if a player is only an inch offside, he is still offside.
I was surprised the Kante handball wasn't given, and also surprised he didn't put his hands down to prevent the ball hitting an arm when he faced up with Firmino. He kept his hands in the air, which is surely a deliberate act of making yourself bigger, no?
He extends his arms out as he thinks Firmino is about to cross it, most likely instinctive, but I don't think it's a case of him not being able to get his arms out of the way.
The Werner offside was a lot like the Mane offside vs Everton, where even close ups of the still images don't really make it clear how he was offside. Drawing lines from the sleeves and armpits is proving to be a far too inconsistent way of making that decision.
He extends his arms out as he thinks Firmino is about to cross it, most likely instinctive, but I don't think it's a case of him not being able to get his arms out of the way.
The Werner offside was a lot like the Mane offside vs Everton, where even close ups of the still images don't really make it clear how he was offside. Drawing lines from the sleeves and armpits is proving to be a far too inconsistent way of making that decision.
For offside it should be a still frame with no lines allowed. If you can't tell it is offside from that, it is not off. Would anyone be against that?
If it keeps going like this the laws may as well be ripped up and rewritten entirely around VAR. Or find human solutions, train the refs to a higher standard, experiment with 2-3 refs on the pitch and only keep the stuff that fits the game.
VAR is shite, everywhere, not just in England as many on here like to claim. The players, managers, and most of the fans don't want it.
If it keeps going like this the laws may as well be ripped up and rewritten entirely around VAR. Or find human solutions, train the refs to a higher standard, experiment with 2-3 refs on the pitch and only keep the stuff that fits the game.
VAR is shite, everywhere, not just in England as many on here like to claim. The players, managers, and most of the fans don't want it.
They've tried that elsewhere, it didn't work. They ended up switching to what we have now.
It's a moot point anyway as there's due to be a new system in place within a few years.
Aye. Fans get pissed off when they look at the freeze frame and cannot see an offside. Aside from abandoning VAR, the obvious solution is to set a time limit (eg 5 seconds) with a still frame for a referee in the stand to decide. Quick decision made and less anality around the rules. We must not lose the emotional response to a goal. Anything longer than a few seconds and it's an anti-climax that saps the passion out of the game. We have already lost it in some cases such as the Werner finish last night. It's so flat and at odds with everything that attracted fans and players to the game in the first place.
I disagreed with VAR before it was implemented and I disagree with it still, and here's why. The laws that have been running the game were not written with VAR in mind and are having to change to adapt, leading to farce. For example, all the handball confusion now is caused because the handball rule we had was completely clear and pretty much everyone understood it and we also understood it was open to interpretation and therefore allowed some leeway for the ref. We had it for decades and every now and again you'd get a decision that you could argue was poor, but was it ruining the game? No. Now that you can slow the game down and examine from all angles the nature of handball has changed and no leewway is allowed, which nesessitates ever increasing complexity to try to cover every case.
Quite how we've gotten to the interpretation of the handball law is literally different for attackers and defenders is beyond me. In the cases above, any sensible football fan, player, pundit would say the Kante handball is significantly more deserving of punishment than Lemina's, and yet the decisions are reversed. Further: they're not reversed because a referee in the heat of a game makes a decision based on a single view, they've been reversed after detailed examination. Is the situation with handball more satisfying now or 5 years ago? Its a no brainer for me.
As for things like offside, the thing I don't like is the decision comes down to literaly millimeters, which implies accuracy in the system that simply isn't there. The passer's foot will be in contact with the ball for a number of frames, the attackers move in those frames, the cameras in the stadium need to be perfectly calibrated etc. Does all this allow for an accuracy they are using it for now? Almost certainly not. In the case of the Chelsea goal above, I also fail to see how the second attacker isn't active. When the ball is played through and its 2 on 1, are we meant to believe the second attacker doesn't influence what the keeper does at all?
For me, the benefits VAR have brought are vastly outweighed by the negatives. Could the systems be improved? Yeah, but I don't see it.
Quite how we've gotten to the interpretation of the handball law is literally different for attackers and defenders is beyond me. In the cases above, any sensible football fan, player, pundit would say the Kante handball is significantly more deserving of punishment than Lemina's, and yet the decisions are reversed. Further: they're not reversed because a referee in the heat of a game makes a decision based on a single view, they've been reversed after detailed examination. Is the situation with handball more satisfying now or 5 years ago? Its a no brainer for me.
As for things like offside, the thing I don't like is the decision comes down to literaly millimeters, which implies accuracy in the system that simply isn't there. The passer's foot will be in contact with the ball for a number of frames, the attackers move in those frames, the cameras in the stadium need to be perfectly calibrated etc. Does all this allow for an accuracy they are using it for now? Almost certainly not. In the case of the Chelsea goal above, I also fail to see how the second attacker isn't active. When the ball is played through and its 2 on 1, are we meant to believe the second attacker doesn't influence what the keeper does at all?
For me, the benefits VAR have brought are vastly outweighed by the negatives. Could the systems be improved? Yeah, but I don't see it.
Just like that City - Villa game. Ref makes a big mistake. Covered up by saying "technically he was right but now we are changing the interpretation for it to be wrong", even though it was always wrong.
Will say that this "clarification" is only going to cause more issues. It's never been about accidental vs intentional hand balls, or it shouldn't be. It's about is their arm in a weird position and/or making their body frame bigger, along with intentionally touching it with your hand also being a foul. You can have accidental contacts like Kante's where his hand is next to his head and elbow is bent out making a much larger area. It's accidental. His arm shouldn't be there though. The Lemina handball is just crazy and should never have been called, and thankfully won't be called going forward.
It was a pre-scheduled meeting to change the laws from July 1st onwards. It happens every year. This isn't a matter of 'interpretation' but themchanging the laws. If you don't believe me, go and check the current laws of the game. They're hosted on the IFAB website and very easily accessible.
Nobody disagrees with you the law was stupid, so I don't know why you're so intently digging yourself in on whether or not it is the law rather than just admitting you were wrong. It doesn't change the overarching point that we all agree on that the law is stupid.
Edit: In fact, I think you’ll reply without checking them, so I’ll do it for you and save us both time:
These are the laws of the game as they currently stand and under which the game was officiated yesterday. It’s absolutely black and white:
It is an offence if a player:
- after the ball has touched their or a team-mate’s hand/arm, even if accidental, immediately:
- scores in the opponents’ goal
- creates a goal-scoring opportunity
https://www.theifab.com/laws/chapter/32/section/92/
Last edited:
Basically this.
Referee wasn't even involved, I doubt, but the Referee/VAR/Officials 'team' got it 100% correct by disallowing it. That doesn't make the decision 'ethically right', but that is the rule.
Taking the context wider than just that one goal, but. I don't know if "changing" that rule will help - it will likely make it just as messy as other ones that are open to 'interpretation' if it's not worded correctly.
It's a bit like the one the other week where a penalty was conceded (possibly in italy) because a sub touched the ball before it technically left play. Odd rules that you'd rarely see actioned, but still technically the right decision.
Better to have the right decisions for morally questionable reasons, than the wrong decisions made because the referee thought they were being smart by using some obscure rule (like the Vertonghen one a few years ago where he was flagged offside in his own half).
So if I'm reading that right any accidental handball by the goalscorer will still be an offence but an accidental handball by a teammate in the build up won't be.
On the downside, they've also confirmed that the upper arm will continue to be used for offsides.
They're all fecking morons, to be honest.
It's piss easy to solve this, i literally have no idea whatsoever how they've managed to cock things up so badly
Not so sure it's a clear 'upside'.
Currently, defending players in their own box act like venus de milo so they don't risk giving away a penalty. There's a high risk aspect to it, and it's contentious even at that.
Allowing attacking players the possibility of being able to block a clearance or control the ball with their hand in some way that can be interpreted as accidental is a minefield. There's also zero risk to it. If a defending team goes to clear a loose ball in the box, there's no chance an attacker has a "risk" involved as I doubt they'd get cautioned unless it was clearly intentional.
Therefore, you'll probably see attackers starting to run around with jazz hands in the opponents box/area because there's two potential benefits:
1) you can stop a counter attack with little risk
2) you could get a chance to assist a goal if the handball is interpreted as 'accidental'
Next season this will inevitably be the new "the game's gone"
I think it would be difficult to deliberately block/control a ball with your hands in a way that is deemed accidental but still gives significant advantage over just trying to block it with another part of your body. You'd still need to have your hands in what is considered a natural position (i.e. not making the body bigger) and make sure there's no obvious hand-to-ball motion. The risk that you get it wrong doesn't strike me as being worth sacrificing an attempt at blocking/controlling legitimately.
Only a presentation mind, no plans to even trial it. So under those rule the below would be onside:
I think it would be a bad idea. It wouldn't impact the mm offsides that bother people so much at all, just move it to a different part of the body. And while it seems like the attacker would be given an advantage, I suspect there would inevitably be tactical adjustments that have the opposite effect. Playing a high-line probably wouldn't be viable any more, for example. Situations like free kicks on the edge of the box would be a mess as well, as defenders simply couldn't allow attacker to gain that much of an advantage on the defensive line. Plus it would make judging offsides much more difficult in games without VAR.
Only a presentation mind, no plans to even trial it. So under those rule the below would be onside:
I think it would be a bad idea. It wouldn't impact the mm offsides that bother people so much at all, just move it to a different part of the body. And while it seems like the attacker would be given an advantage, I suspect there would inevitably be tactical adjustments that have the opposite effect. Playing a high-line probably wouldn't be viable any more, for example. Situations like free kicks on the edge of the box would be a mess as well, as defenders simply couldn't allow attacker to gain that much of an advantage on the defensive line. Plus it would make judging offsides much more difficult in games without VAR.
It's a stupid idea, and it's absolutely staggering that Wenger has been beating this drum for over a year without anyone telling him how fecking stupid it is.
It simply does not solve any of the issues with offsides and VAR. It just moves the marginal line drawing back to a different point whilst massively affecting the balance of the game. If it wasn't 'Le Professeur', but instead some other random ex-pro, it would have been chucked in the dustbin where the idea belongs.
Last edited: