Another week of football, some VAR controversy to fill the column and annoy the fans. If you missed it, Coventry scored the winner in the last minute in extra time of a match – an FA Cup semi-final. Just, oh wait, the pc says no. The VAR ruled that Haji Wright was offside and the goal was disallowed. Coventry enthusiasts shouted that the formula had gone wrong, but it didn’t matter. Man United kept winning and the dreams vanished forever.
Systems such as video refereeing have been brought in to make the game fairer, taking into account the objective of the product and the scenario of fans and competitors. And yet, years later, with all this technology, we find ourselves angrier than ever.
In fact, I think the generation kills the game and that the old tactics were better. Here’s why.
For many years, we’ve judged the game the same way. The competent authority appointed several referees for the match. The main arbiter was the judge, jury, and executioner according to the rules. The players played until the whistle blew and the referee’s decision was final. Whatever happened, it happened and the game went on.
It’s not the best system. Humans make mistakes. Arbitrators would make bad decisions. But in the end, when the whistle blew, the referee’s resolve prevailed. There were no protests, we had to let it go and move on.
This worked well until a fashionable evil appeared: instant relay. Suddenly, the stadiums were filled with television cameras filming the game from each and every angle. Every once in a while, it was apparent that a referee had made a mistake, with television stations broadcasting irrefutable evidence to thousands of viewers across the country. At Wimbledon, a bullet went in, not out. A striker was on the side before scoring. The fans started complaining and complaining. It wasn’t enough!
And yet, the formula held firm. Although it pains enthusiasts to see a referee ruin their favorite team, there was nothing they could do. The arbitrator’s decision was final. No one can simply protest or cancel the appeal. The resolution was made, the starting gun was fired. The game continued.
Then he came up with a brilliant idea. Why don’t we use those gots and all this video to check the work of the referee?This way there will never be a problem: any questionable resolution can be reviewed in the heat of the moment. There will never be a bad decision again!
Oh, what a solution that sounded. And it ruined everything.
Enter the Video Assistant Referee (VAR). The formula aimed to bring fairness and accuracy to a game rife with human error. The Video Assistant Referee was an official who assisted in consulting the judgment of the head referee based on the available video evidence. They would get information from an organization of video assistants. Referees (AVARs) sitting on stadium screens, examining the fit from all angles. No, I didn’t invent that acronym of the moment.
Thought of as a technological marvel. So many cameras, so many views, so many slow-motion images to go through. The assembled VAR team would take a look at everything from fouls to fouls. The data would be relayed to the head referee on the field, who could simply refer to a video replay screen on the side of the field if he wanted to see things with his own eyes.
The most important thing for VAR is to be an assistive tool. This was to consult the head referee, who still had the final decision at the end of the day.
It would be understandable if you thought that giving more data to a referee so that they can do their job would be a smart thing to do. Instead, the formula has a curse on the lips of enthusiasts and a scourge on football’s reputation.
As soon as it was introduced, VAR began to pervert football. Fans were quick to denounce the formula’s flaws, while entire leagues followed suit due to the unreliability of VAR formulas. Assistant referees were asked to suspend their offside appeals to allow the video The regime took control. Players were temporarily cautioned for continually difficult video reviews. The new regulations would see yellow cards for players who made desperate gestures “on a television screen” in an attempt to disallow an opponent’s goal. They didn’t concentrate on the game, but on the formula that was guilty of it.
VAR achieves one thing with brutal technological efficiency: it takes life out of the game. The spontaneity of celebrating a goal is gone. Forget about running into the stands, hugging your teammates, and hitting the air with mild joy. Instead, there are now a lot of goals resulting in a one-minute complaint while the referee consults the video screens and reviews the footage. Enthusiasts sit in stunted silence, sitting in the dreaded and never-ending suspense of “purpose” or “purposelessness. “
The game’s immediacy and raw emotion have been shattered. Instead of jumping for joy, enthusiasts and players alike await the verdict of an invisible and remote official. The communal delight of instant joy or depression is mitigated by the mere presence of the system. What was once an undeniable game, now feels like a courtroom drama where each and every game can be questioned and over-analytical.
The problem isn’t just football. Professional cricket is now overloaded with microphone systems to pay attention to the slightest sound of the bat on the ball. Tennis, weighed down by radar reviews of online calls. The interruptions never stop, as does each and every player’s more productive interest in pulling out the tape measure every time he threatens to screw his opponent. The more generation there is, the more complaints are made and the more we spend in the game that we all came to see.
With so many photographs to review and so many degrees of referees involved, VAR can slow down football. There’s no point in seeking to do it faster or better. The correct resolution is to remove it entirely.
As it stands, smart football matches are interrupted by frustrating video checks. Even the best matches are ruined when the VAR formula fails or a bad decision still occurs. Moments of jubilant birthday party come undone very occasionally when someone’s shoelace looks like a hair in front of someone’s pinky finger at a very important moment in the game.
Yes, bad calls will come. Yes, it’s going to frustrate enthusiasts, but it will frustrate them a lot less than the current way of doing things. In my experience, enthusiasts get over a bad resolution much faster when it comes to a single referee and a whistle. Are there 4 referees, 16 camera angles, and a bunch of lines on the video screen?They’ll be furious for days because this mountain of evidence suggests their computer has been scammed. They probably won’t get over it. They will complain about it for years.
Let the referees make the decisions. Arbitration is an art form. A smart referee understands how the game works and knows when to let the game breathe rather than when to exert control. This sophisticated art is lost to the hesitant interruptions of the video inspection brigade.
Football used to be better. They were foolish to think that they could achieve it by measuring it to the nth degree. Eliminate VAR, eliminate interruptions. Put it back on the referees in the box and let the game unfold.
“You’re always right””$$$”==where we are.
An improvement would be to abandon the offside rule. Less threat of misjudgment, more goals, easy fix.
However, achieving a goal is tedious. I think VAR has raised expectations without extending results.
Get rid of VAR and regain the acceptability of some injustices in sport. Ours wasn’t much worse before.
Abandon the offside rule? But then, how smart would other people do with the salt and pepper shaker?!; -)
Or if spawning is the hammer of the day, do it in real-time and use a laser to map the offside line so it’s visual for players as well.
This leads to groups playing 8-1-1 formations with other people loitering around the opponent’s target all the time. It’s like watching table tennis.
Did you see that ridiculous display last night?
The thing about Arsenal is that they’re looking to get in!
Lmao. . . Jen is crazy.
I don’t think it’s valid to say that all those systems are detrimental to their sport. The way this happens in rugby works out pretty well: the referee of the televised match is only invoked when the referee in the box doesn’t know how to call anything (often because there are a lot of players in the way). This slows down the game, but is often only used a few times a day every few minutes.
Totally agree with the post. In Argentina it’s even worse. Most of the cameras used for VAR are the same ones used for TV broadcasts, this means slower FPS, so one frame is out of play, the next is not, and no one knows what happened. And that’s happening in the stadiums of the big groups that have a lot more cameras. Imagine what happens in small group camps where there are only a few old cameras.
VAR is absurd and ruins the game.
Maybe like in volleyball, when the team can challenge the referees’ decision. They have a limit that is subtracted when the team makes a mistake.
What happens if Coventry wins?
Does football exist?
Does the NFL exist?
What about the NBA? I haven’t heard of that in a long time.
Interest in soccer rises and falls in the United States depending on our participation in the World Cup.
I get the idea that systems like this are primarily set up to protect sports betting, whether it’s legal or illegal. The amounts of money invested in professional sports are ridiculous and the option to divert this flow in a way that maximizes profits will be implemented. one way or another. If there are doubts about the legitimacy of video reviews, to mitigate allegations, simply make ALL VAR/AVAR video streams available for review. Then, you can create a secondary or tertiary industry of reviewers for reviewers.
As it turns out, every game has to take care of existing video editing capabilities, as they improve. I like the fact that NCAA basketball limits how it can be used. . . So towards the end of the game, there may be It can be very heavy, but for the first 35 minutes, it’s normally only used if there’s a problem with the clock.
I think the real question will be when the coach will be able to do the full refereeing, when he won’t impose a time limit on the referees to consult with the coach. It looks like it’s potentially going to be a lot fairer and a lot less intrusive. Personally, I’m a little tired of seeing basketball center backs looking to figure out what kind of officiating they see these days. I see that there are many things to improve. But I wonder if it probably wouldn’t be like that yet. be unpleasant in some way. And it will actually motivate critical thinking about rules, whether they’re smart as written or whether they want to be replaced to be less off-putting in the context of the best enforcement.
I’ve wondered what was the defining moment in the Dune universe when they started deciding that computers shouldn’t be allowed to do the thinking for humans and started banning them, and now I know.
There is a prequel through Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson that explains the origin of Butlerian Jihad. Don’t read it. It’s horrible.
Automatic AI-based offside cameras are being installed ahead of next season in the English Premier League. Part of this article turns out to be misinformed: Hawkeye has largely been a success in tennis and cricket, VAR in football is more implemented in some competitions (FIFA WC) than others (La Liga). Arguably, this is more of a governance challenge than a technological one.
For me, the Var is a French department. . . GRRR!
A is all you need, period. Why this debate?
The challenge of football is what it is not. This is Australian rules football!
As an American, I will give you a direct exchange; Give us the VAR and you can have Angel Hernandez. (It can’t be worse in football than it is in baseball. )
It is the same people who referee the VAR who referee the matches, there is an absolute clash of interests in this scenario, it is as if the corporate administrators sit in the remuneration forums of other corporations to set salaries. Or a police force investigating its own corruption. (Not that I think Var is necessarily corrupt, but the impression is that they may be without a problem. The other VARs are absolutely separate from the referees running on the field.
It’s not about counteracting their prejudices but about overcoming their limited attention and attitude in the moment.
Tennis has solved this problem.
They don’t broadcast replays. They show PC-generated models that show what the PC has seen. And there you have it, no conflicts or worries.
There is no concept if style correlates with reality.
There’s a lot of money at stake in today’s professional sports. What are you waiting for? It’s only going to get worse and it’s going to happen.
I hope that football will eventually incorporate on-ball transmitters for progression/goal-line calls. Then tap the sensors on the players’ laps. Maybe more sensors on the shirt to put calls on hold and a mask. You could also integrate an invisible fence underneath the paint mark on the ground. . .
Like fencing (and kendo), where everyone carries so many gadgets with so many wires and transceivers dangling that the movements become illegal just because they might become entangled with a wire.
“kendo”
Ah, this. Why can’t beekeepers settle their disputes without resorting to the blade?
As a fencer, this just isn’t true. Electronic scoring is used at basically every level above grade school gym class. For foil and saber at least, equipment issues are way down the list of problems. They are very, very simple systems. It’s the ref that’s always a problem.
Probably a symptom of the same deeper ailment that ruins games in general and creates ever-growing rulebooks to help us keep track of excessive cases that can be easily judged through a clever referee (or general manager in the case of board games). without turning each and every moment of the game into a real legal war between the defenders of the regulations.
Eventually, we’ll give up on players and fields altogether and the total game will come down to watching computers argue over which purely hypothetical team or player has been breached to the max (fractured?I’m not talking about the long-term). computer) in Conway’s new exclusively fictional life game, FootTennisBocceBasketBowl. simulation.
Think about how much time we’re going to save by not having to participate in anything!
Let’s call it Super Sportsball.
Am I the only one who asked if anyone else had any idea about this article about football?
The solution would be more technology. VAR is other guys looking for things. Install sensors on players’ shirts and on the ball, as well as sensors around the field, and let an absolutely independent formula determine without delay whether a player is offside, whether the ball has crossed a line or gone out of bounds. Keep a referee to make subjective decisions and things that sensors can’t trip over, like handball.
Sport is intended to be a diversion and a way to keep physical or intellectual condition at an optimal level. Things start happening as soon as large sums of cash are involved. Large sums of money invite corruption. Apparently, a few years ago, the football world championship was held in a hot, desert country that does not even have a football team of its own, and it was organized thanks to the corruption of some officials.
I don’t watch sports. I don’t see any sense in my physical or intellectual health.
Addendum: The very concept of ‘earning’ a hundred million euros a year seems to me to be absolutely appalling. Also, the concept of “selling” players to another football club is very close to slavery to me.
100% disagree. Yes, VAR makes some mistakes and its use is still not optimal, but the opportunities are brutal failures such as the hand of God in ’86, or the false penalty in the final of the ’90 World Cup (one for, one against Argentina). . . ). You can simplify things consistently with allowing the team captain or coach to have 2 review requests consistent with half, similar to tennis, which would mean that only goals, questionable consequences, or clear errors would be recalled. That’s it, I’ve got it constant for you.
Be kind and respectful to make the feedback segment great. (Comment Policy)
This is what Akismet uses to reduce spam. Find out how your observational knowledge is processed.