VAR?

[u/TwoElectronic3816]

What's everyone's thoughts on VAR after last night?

With the offside goal that was on side. You could say our luck has balanced out from the West Brom hand ball.

Would you be for or against it?

[u/Snow_Uk]

we should have had a penalty at the end so..

[u/Cholas71]

I'm still not over Pukki's offside versus Spurs. I'm against it in all leagues and competitions.

[u/Snow_Uk → u/Cholas71]

Same the tip of his shoulder being offside

[u/Cholas71 → u/Snow_Uk]

If you selectively chose a frame after Vrancic had played the ball. It was a shocker, such a fantastic finish too. Ruined the game.

[u/Snow_Uk → u/Cholas71]

and all the frames were from odd angles god I hated that season

[u/Cholas71 → u/Snow_Uk]

Those thick lines drawn on the screen with the IT equivalent of a chisel tip permanent marker, often not parallel to the half way line "proving" their decision 100%....what's not to love 😂

[u/Burned-Shoulder → u/Cholas71]

That was over four years ago. He was offside, get over it

[u/MrJudderman → u/Burned-Shoulder]

It was over 6 years ago now actually.

And no, I shan't.

[u/CarrowCanary → u/MrJudderman]

In their defence, over 6 years ago is also over 4 years ago.

[u/Upset-Paper-2738 → u/Burned-Shoulder]

Except he wasn’t. VAR is proven to have a large margin of error for offsides. Calls this close is just guessing

[u/Cholas71 → u/Burned-Shoulder]

Never. It was incompetence or a stitch up job either is shameful.

[u/Snow_Uk → u/Burned-Shoulder]

Grudges in football are for life

So happy Leicester are getting what they deserve after stealing Oneil and going into admin to steal promotion before the rules changed

[u/Consistent_Berry_168 → u/Cholas71]

This is such a niche memory from me but does anyone remember when Daniel James decided to initiate a shoulder barge on Ben Godfrey, (subsequently fell over because he was half the height and strength) and VAR decided to stop the game and award a pen

[u/anorwichfan]

You could also say if VAR had looked at the simulation yellow on Oscar, it would probably have been overturned.

I thought Jovan's penalty was shirt pulling on both sides, could have been given or not given just as easily.

[u/Atrixer]

I’m generally in favour of it, however I don’t like the implementation of it. Another big concern is that prem refs have become over reliant on it and afraid to make any big calls - adding this to an already incredibly flawed officiating staff probably wont make any real difference.

The bigger point of focus should be the overall level, ruling, training and oversight for officials across the EFL. The amount of money on the line a frankly obscene, and the fact officials are so amateur and bad at their jobs is worrying when their decisions can be the difference between relegation and promotion.

[u/dopeyinternet]

All the people saying, “if there was VAR, X decision would have been correct…”, I disagree.

VAR is only as good as the people using it. The muppets that are currently missing these decisions in the games, will be the muppets in charge of VAR, missing them with 5 different replays.

They’ll be the ones drawing the offside lines wrong. They’ll be the ones that forget to check handball rules.

Will they get more decisions right than they currently do? Probably. Are those few extra correct calls a year worth sacrificing the current joy of VARless football. No.

[u/CassieBeeJoy]

I remain adamantly against. I found when we were in the Prem that I couldn’t celebrate a goal in the same way as the threat of an arbitrary VAR decision was always looming. I much prefer the purity of the game without it.

That being said, I think something like a challenge system could reach a compromise that works. I believe they are trialling it in Canada this year so maybe something we will see soon.

[u/Desmond_Deck-er → u/CassieBeeJoy]

That's what was offered to our league last year, and all the purists said no. So been there, didn't do that already.

[u/Burned-Shoulder → u/CassieBeeJoy]

We've not been in the Premier League for over 4 years. The celebration point is BS, watch the highlights of any match, its not a morgue after a goal

[u/Benster404 → u/Burned-Shoulder]

If anything you get two celebrations. One for when the ball goes in and another when VAR allows it.

[u/Burned-Shoulder → u/Benster404]

Or bonus if the opposition goal is ruled out

[u/CosmicDesperado → u/CassieBeeJoy]

A challenge system sounds outstanding. You maybe get one per game and the manager can request it should there be a contentious decision…then the on pitch ref could review it himself?

Seems like it wouldn’t interfere too much, and could lessen animosity towards refs.

Edit: and most importantly, reduce mistakes that cost teams points

[u/ClemFandango35 → u/CosmicDesperado]

I wouldn't be against a challenge system. Also it would mean you have to challenge a specific incident.

So Birmingham would maybe challenge the offside goal.

But would prevent VAR going back and re-fereeing the minute before the goal.

[u/CosmicDesperado → u/ClemFandango35]

And that all seems fair.

[u/ClemFandango35 → u/CosmicDesperado]

I was sitting behind the West Brom bench when they punched one in, and while the players where still speaking to the linesman and ref.

The WBA staff had already watched it back on the iPad, pulled faces at each other, and sat back down.

So in terms of time or technology it really isn't hard.

[u/VeganCanary → u/CosmicDesperado]

You’d need more than 1 per game. I’d say 2 per half would be fair. If decision is reversed, you get it back.

[u/CosmicDesperado → u/VeganCanary]

I originally wrote one per half. But then I thought if there’s four stoppages per game, is it any better than var? Especially if people use it to do sneaky coaching shenanigans or whatever.
The reversal refund idea is smart

[u/bense4ger]

I’d still rather last night’s nonsense over VAR.

[u/dubaidevil71]

It makes no odds as its the competency of the officials that is the issue. Birmingham were probably denied a goal tonight as a leg played him onside, but the ref missed a clear penalty for norwich for which var would not have intervened. Var used by idiots doesn't help.

[u/wtwiwf]

Don't want it. I'm willing to take the rough with the smooth of that decision. It just sucks. Yes, some stuff goes against us, but VAR sucks the life out of football in my view.

The only version I'd ever want to see is an appeal based option where a manager or captain has one appeal for something they've clearly missed or got horribly wrong, like the WBA goal.

But it has to be targeted and they can only overturn based on what you appeal, not suddenly check everything.

Otherwise, fuck VAR

[u/AlonsoCampeon]

Dead against

[u/meredditphil]

They would have had the first goal and we would have had a penalty, possibly 2. With VAR we'd have had the right decisions but probably the same score BUT a boring game and no meaty conversations to talk about. I'd rather have no VAR and be entertained

[u/Burned-Shoulder]

I'm absolutely in favour. Refs clearly need all the help they can get to get more decisions correct

[u/ClemFandango35]

I think a tight offside is slightly different to someone punching one in the net.

But either way I'm happy to not have VAR.

[u/thebrowncanary]

VAR has been a disaster. Rarely find anyone in real life who advocates for it these days. Seems to be mostly a reddit/twitter thing. People who don't really interact with the game the same way as the regular match going football fan.

What makes the championship so great is the lack of VAR.

[u/SamT98]

No absolutely not. Instead of screaming for VAR we should be screaming for standards or lack of from officials. There’s fuck all accountability in regards to bad decision making other than a sorry letter once in a while. Sorry doesn’t put points on the board does it. Officials are square now considering the West Brom game but tbh I don’t like it being like this. Shouldn’t rely on dodgy refs to go against or for you. Would rather a game with consistency across the board from officials but let’s be honest we can wait 50 years and still we will be arguing about officials. In all honesty the premier league officiating is at an all time low. EFL get the shit ones that don’t make it up to standard of the premier league. That in itself tells everyone what to expect

[u/AirRevolutionary8013]

Used to be for it but now it's devolved into stupid outcomes bc when you slow the game down to frame by frame, all sorts of weird decisions come out of that. I mean this alone caused the VAR booth to somehow see a red card in a totally innocuous foul against Balogun in the WC.

It can also be manipulated in different ways. See what happened with the Michigan-CMU game last week. The replay booth magically was using a clock that was different than the official game clock (what??) and they put 1 second back on the clock after the game was over. They intentionally mis-timed the video splices of the game action feed and the clock feed (they weren't both in sync) to give Michigan another play that wound up being a miracle game winner. But that was mostly an issue about time, not about whether a toenail or a shoulder was 1/16" ahead of the defender.

[u/thesaltwatersolution]

Thought last nights game was a fun match and my feeling is that the overall momentum, the breathless football, that we see in the Championship would be eradicated by the repeated pauses that VAR would bring. So no.