VAR, Refs and Linesmen | General Discussion

the flaw of this method is they need to draw lines on 90 degree projections on the floor not on player's head and shoulder.
Space is 3Dimensional not two

No, the flaw is that his used the glass lines, if he did off the centre circle line then maybe.

Also the line down is from the shoulder, as you said it's 3 dimensional meaning that the line down from his head would move the line higher

See the u axis.

2-15615364034562-3362.gif
 
Last edited:
Let’s not pretend that the linesmen were any better or didn’t give their fair share of nightmare calls as well. I am not advocating for no VAR. It’s still a net positive, but some rules need to be looked at.

They were certainly not infallible, but neither is VAR. But my biggest issue with VAR is not that it can be wrong. It’s the dampening it puts on watching the game. It doesn’t have to be perfect, it has to be instant. Flag down - it’s a goal. Flag up - offside. Nothing more is needed.
 
Ah c’mon now. You’re a scientist. You don’t just use “one size fits all” confidence intervals, do you? Each incident will have a different margin of error. Are the defender and attacker running in opposite directions? Or both running the same way? Is the through ball stationary when it’s hit? Or rolling? If so, is it rolling towards or away from his foot? All minor details but can combine to make significant differences. In some scenarios using 5cm (or whatever) thick lines will reveal the ‘true’ outcome. In others they may need to be 10 or 20cm thick for separation to be a legitimate offside.

My point is that the technology will still make incorrect calls. Combine this with the very obvious human failings around everything to do with VAR and if couldn’t be more obvious (to me anyway) it’s made the game of football considerably worse.

The very idea that we have to think about positions of heads vs shoulder and 5cm thick red and blue lines when we should have been celebrating a classic goal that a good, experienced assistant official figured was legitimate in real time is all the evidence we should need to demonstrate that VAR is ruining the game.
Do you expect the eggheads at the PGMOL to be able to properly apply those things? They can’t even understand that getting kicked in the head is more dangerous than having someone’s studs graze a shinpad.

Problem with all these margins of error, regardless of if they are 5cm, 10cm or 50cm, is there will always be the same complaints if a player is x+1 cm offside.
 
I mean it's laughable, you have an ex ref talking about these VAR decsions who has had the whole weekend to look at them, and the City one should have been offside because a player is blocking the keepers view whilst offside, but the Liverpool first goal should have been given even though Salah was blocking the keepers view whilst offside, the Ward Prowse handball was handball in his view, but in the view of one his a pals (I think he said an ex ref), it wasn't a handball, or course all the United calls were laughable to them all.

If they just didn't bother, both the offside goals would have still been given, as the Ward Prowse one wouldn't, Arsenal would have got their penalty, Garnacho his goal, and Rice his goal, all the outcomes would have been the same, the whole thing would have been no less controversal afterwards, but a lot more enjoyable to watch.
 
Except it wasn't a head kick, close maybe but no contact to his head

The pictures I’ve seen definitely show contact. The problem with a photo is that you can’t gauge force/ movement etc though. Not a red for me.
 
And we’re supposed to accept all the delays and general bollockology that comes with VAR without the big decisions being consistently fair/correct.

I couldn’t give a shite if they are more often correct than they were before VAR (they probably are) because of the the way VAR has a) spoiled the experience of watching live sport and b) ongoing refereeing errors are much less forgivable than they were before VAR.

The whole thing is fecked.

They don't even really know why they're using it. They don't want to re-referee games, and it's only there to correct "clear and obvious" errors, yet offsides are done by armpits and toenails, and the goal-line tech (which I consider under the VAR umbrella) is done by the tiniest millimeter of the ball. Additionally, none of us (as fans) actually know how accurate this technology is, other than having to take their word for it, but even then we've had at least a few instances of this stuff being wrong.

VAR should be there to remove all subjectivity from the calls a referee has to make (or at least as much as possible). With the "clear and obvious" line, what one referee (or even the same referee) deems, for example, a red card challenge one game, may be called differently without VAR intervention in another, despite being an identical challenge. What's the point of VAR if we're still turning around and going "well, I can see why it wasn't given" for major decisions?

There's three major changes they need to make for me:
  1. Full transparency of decisions made by VAR. We need to hear the discussions and why they're coming to the decision they make.
  2. With offsides in particular (and could be applied to goal-line technology I suppose), an "umpire's call" type system as they have in cricket. Some of these calls are far too close to be decided in the manner they currently are (manually drawn lines on a manually selected frame of action, from what is often a less-than-ideal camera angle). My preference would be for advantage to be given to the attacker in these situations, so not necessarily sticking with the on field decision if it's too close to determine.
  3. Some laws of the game need heavy clarification. Handballs, for example, should be the same all over the pitch and it's daft that we essentially have two rules now where you can give away a free-kick for something that wouldn't be a penalty. Also, what a handball is, what constitutes a dangerous/reckless challenge, etc.
 
You're aware that this charge could simply be reversed and directed at you, no? It always amazes me how people are highly adept at identifying cognitive bias in others, and can't seemingly acknowledge that they themselves might be doing the same.
What? Its a stupid comment based on his bias, how calling one right decision prevents them from makin other mistakes? cant you see the stupid logic?
 
How making one right decision prevents them from making other mistakes? :lol:
Ok. Last thing I’ll say on this. The match was 1-1 after full time, a fair result. But you lost because you had Evans and Maguire on the ptch and you had a goaile not named David de Gea who probably would have kept the winning goal out. In my opinion de Gea is one of the best in the world at stopping shots, not at penalties but stopping shots just like the one that beat you. Do you agree
 
:lol: The balls that far off Casemiros foot Garnacho is almost controlling it. What a joke.

Click and pause to see the differents frames, it's the correct one. Small margins but Garnacho is offside. Give it a rest.
 
Ok. Last thing I’ll say on this. The match was 1-1 after full time, a fair result. But you lost because you had Evans and Maguire on the ptch and you had a goaile not named David de Gea who probably would have kept the winning goal out. In my opinion de Gea is one of the best in the world at stopping shots, not at penalties but stopping shots just like the one that beat you. Do you agree
No, it's a stupid way of looking at the match.
 
Ok. Last thing I’ll say on this. The match was 1-1 after full time, a fair result. But you lost because you had Evans and Maguire on the ptch and you had a goaile not named David de Gea who probably would have kept the winning goal out. In my opinion de Gea is one of the best in the world at stopping shots, not at penalties but stopping shots just like the one that beat you. Do you agree
How are you still here
 

Click and pause to see the differents frames, it's the correct one. Small margins but Garnacho is offside. Give it a rest.


With how marginal it is the lack of enough frames could actually be the difference. Kind of shows how stupid these offsides are. The fact we have people freeze framing and photoshops isn't good for the sport.
 
He isn't. It's cute how you're trying to convince yourself otherwise though.
I don't need to convince myself, facts are already set in stone. Just trying to help the poor souls stuck on this for the last 24 hours.
Focus your energy on the Holjund penalty because you have there a genuine issue that should have paused the game for a longer review and call to the monitor.
 
I don't need to convince myself, facts are already set in stone. Just trying to help the poor souls stuck on this for the last 24 hours.
Focus your energy on the Holjund penalty because you have there a genuine issue that should have paused the game for a longer review and call to the monitor.

They can't be set in stone because human error is involved in both selecting the point where the lines are drawn and when selecting the frame used.
 
I don't need to convince myself, facts are already set in stone. Just trying to help the poor souls stuck on this for the last 24 hours.
Focus your energy on the Holjund penalty because you have there a genuine issue that should have paused the game for a longer review and call to the monitor.
I don't need to focus my energy, I'm capable of noticing more than one refereeing mistake that went your way.
 
Same same. VAR has made football a much less enjoyable sport to watch. Even when you’re watching on TV and get to see the actual replays. Infinitely more annoying for those in the stadium. I find it utterly bizarre that so many fans would defend a change that makes a sport they follow because they enjoy watching it, less enjoyable to watch. WTF?

The only thing I would say is that it took Cricket a long time to get DRS right. VAR is going through that awkward period of the tech not being quite good enough and they've implemented strange protocols. Cricket took a while to get to the traffic light system but it pretty much works now and I would say has improved the game.
 
Man decides when he thinks is the exact frame where he thinks the ball is released from the player making the pass. Man decides based on blurry image taken from 50 yards away where he thinks the most advance points of both striker and last defender

I've magic beans for sell to everyone who thinks the above represents infallible, set in stone decision aided by technology that cannot be questioned. VAR decisions that are this close are decided by decisions humans using the technology have made. They're not factual decisions.
 
The only thing I would say is that it took Cricket a long time to get DRS right. VAR is going through that awkward period of the tech not being quite good enough and they've implemented strange protocols. Cricket took a while to get to the traffic light system but it pretty much works now and I would say has improved the game.

I’m sure that’s true but cricket is so much more suited to the technology. There’s constant breaks in play anyway. Every time a ball is bowled. So it doesn’t affect the flow of the game to have these sort of checks. Very different scenario with football.
 
This isn’t related to United getting a favourable decision or unfavourable one but I am losing some of my interest in the game. Without VAR you could just live with the idea that ref got one view and so had to make a decision . Watching games where these people are looking at multiple angles and making strange decisions every game followed by ex refs coming out and agreeing with everything is just hard to watch.

Maybe it’s just me but when the Garnacho goal happened I didn’t move because I knew that it would be checked and so no point even celebrating till we are sure. Then I see it come on screen and commentators & me have no clue if it’s a goal or offside. We are waiting for a guy to then decide and so somehow the VAR review has become the focal point rather than a goal itself. Just pathetic
 
If you took a photo of someone from 150 feet away and placed a cursor on the image where you think the top of his head was, and by doing so you were able to place a real life cross at the same point, when you went up to him to see how close you acually were, you're probably going to be a good few inches out. Possibly more

It's crazy to think that is how goals are being decided in football.
 
This isn’t related to United getting a favourable decision or unfavourable one but I am losing some of my interest in the game. Without VAR you could just live with the idea that ref got one view and so had to make a decision . Watching games where these people are looking at multiple angles and making strange decisions every game followed by ex refs coming out and agreeing with everything is just hard to watch.

Maybe it’s just me but when the Garnacho goal happened I didn’t move because I knew that it would be checked and so no point even celebrating till we are sure. Then I see it come on screen and commentators & me have no clue if it’s a goal or offside. We are waiting for a guy to then decide and so somehow the VAR review has become the focal point rather than a goal itself. Just pathetic

I’m like a broken record about this but agree with you 100%. VAR has fundamentally changed the way we experience watching football. In a way that is very clearly for the worse. So crazy that this has been allowed to happen.
 
I’m like a broken record about this but agree with you 100%. VAR has fundamentally changed the way we experience watching football. In a way that is very clearly for the worse. So crazy that this has been allowed to happen.

Yeah and this is just a tv version. Imagine being in the away end at Emirates yesterday and waiting for this bloke to take his time to decide on a marginal call. I used to always think that there were teething issues and things would get better but now I don’t see how they get better in a sport like football
 
They need to release all audio for all incidents for every game. Cherry picking like this just adds to the lack of transparency

Agreed - other sports manage to do this in real time. It’s not difficult to be transparent.
 
They need to release all audio for all incidents for every game. Cherry picking like this just adds to the lack of transparency

It’s a no brainer. After the recent Mike Dean controversy you need transparency
 
They need to release all audio for all incidents for every game. Cherry picking like this just adds to the lack of transparency
After the feck up in Porto's match this weekend, the portuguese league announced the full audios will be released from now on.
 
They need to release all audio for all incidents for every game. Cherry picking like this just adds to the lack of transparency
Yup. Why not release why the Gabriel tackle on Højlund wasn't worthy of a VAR review for example? Take the "easiest" black/white decision and make it seem like you're being open about what goes on in the VAR room.
 
Ok. Last thing I’ll say on this. The match was 1-1 after full time, a fair result. But you lost because you had Evans and Maguire on the ptch and you had a goaile not named David de Gea who probably would have kept the winning goal out. In my opinion de Gea is one of the best in the world at stopping shots, not at penalties but stopping shots just like the one that beat you. Do you agree
No.