The euphoria of your team scoring a goal gives you a moment’s joy that is rare with everyday life. However, in recent years, the introduction of VAR has put a dampener on celebrating a goal as the three dreaded words/letters fills football fans with despair and anger as they face a tense wait on whether a goal has been disallowed, if so, it is met with anger and disgust as the moments joy is deprived. VAR has caused controversy in many ways.
Why VAR was introduced
It wasn’t so long ago when we were complaining about fouls/offsides not picked up by referees and officials whereby fans were calling for them to be picked up via video. The introduction of VAR has gone some way to address this, however, one of the biggest issues is inconsistency. For example, Maguire and Son kicking out at their opponent after being tackled where the former received no punishment but the latter got sent off. Also, offside goals not being picked up, for example, Dortmund’s winner against Malaga in the Champions League where several Dortmund players appeared to be offside in the lead-up.
Issues
Part of the reason for fan backlash against VAR is the lack of dialogue to match-going fans. Every time there’s a VAR check, fans have no idea what’s going on as all they see is the ref talking to Stockley Park through their earpiece and this is a source of trouble. Other sports such as Rugby Union has a clear dialogue between the fans and the ref which saves much agitation. The Premier League and FA could follow suit however there will always be some sort of backlash on every decision so it’s a catch 22.
Another issue, especially in the Premier League is that refs rarely go over to the monitor, this common practise in Europe and the rest of the world, however, most fans will agree that this practise needs to implemented in England to improve the clarity of decisions. In this case, the ref can see an incident themselves in which VAR could make a recommendation and the ref can decide themselves whether to overturn a decision or not.
Offside and handball
This is another grey area which has caused much controversy. We’ve seen many goals disallowed for marginal offsides this season, for example, Firmino’s armpit offside against Aston Villa. There could be an argument to revise the offside rule for goals to only be disallowed if an offside is blatantly obvious to the naked eye. However, football is game of two halves and rules have already shifted significantly in favour of attackers which means that if there’s too much leeway for offsides, it removes the art of defending and there will be a huge backlash if, for example, a player is a toenail offside and scores an injury-time winner with a toe-poke.
With regards to handball, fans and players will always appeal if a ball strikes an opponent’s hand. The rules state that the current handball rules apply if an advantage is gained through handball or if the ball strikes a player’s arm that’s in an unnatural position. However there still inconsistency surrounding accidental handball over natural hand/arm position.
Recommendations
Overall, the introduction of VAR has been for the better as it has picked up on incidents not spotted by officials. However, the fan experience has been hindered by a lack of communication between officials and fans at grounds. Clearer dialogue between officials and fans via a tannoy inside the stadium can help resolve this as well as the referee being made to go over to the monitor during a check which can help improve the clarity of decisions. All in all, VAR is not perfect but it has meant incidents are being picked up but there needs to be more clarity and communication with match-going fans.
The Real Talk blog 