By Dr3
Imagine being asked to bake a cake using a recipe. An oddly named recipe called the "LGTO"; not to be mistaken with the LOTG (Laws of the Game), the GOT (Game of Thrones) or the LOTR (Lord of the Rings). The LGTO contains all sorts of subjective units of measure like man-handfuls, woman-pinches, beer-jugs, etc. Does it matter that you have a pipette to ration your ingredients and bake that cake?
The problem with VAR (Video Assistant Referee), not to be mistaken with aRV (A Recreational Vehicle), is that there is no problem with VAR.
The 'problem' VAR is facing in it's infancy, is that the laws haven't been adjusted to take advantage of it's obvious benefits. Offside? It should probably be worded just as balls going over lines are; the entire player should be offside. The offside rule was probably originally needed to prevent tactics of booting the ball to infinity as a form of counter-attacking, and teams essentially sitting in the lowest of defensive blocks to create the 'transition'. Being imprecise in definition also served as a built-in protection for the linesman; they could get pretty good at judging at least some portion of a player being past the last defender. The rule was probably not intended to measure Raheem Sterling's armpit or whatever else "can be used to score".
Handball? Maybe mimic the NFL and introduce a replay process that puts the onus on the coaches to be pedantic. Two decision-challenges per game per team. Handball probably needs to be defined as the player moving their hands towards the ball. Maybe only if the review shows that they did move their hand towards the ball in the box, there's a penalty kick. For all else (outside/inside the box and incidental handballs), indirect free-kick and of course the referee judges discipline.
Stopping the flow of the beloved game? Giving kids foamy-mouth nightmares because they celebrated a goal prematurely? Maybe limit how many angles and how many times the review is allowed to be done. Three angles in 15 total seconds once play is stopped, and 5 additional seconds to make a decision. Anything more only serves confirmation bias. Of course, and this should go without saying; show everyone what's being reviewed, and let the referee speak on the loud speaker. Again, just as in the NFL.
The 'problem' with VAR is that it is attempting to make subjective rules objective. It is not that the replay in of itself is inherently incapable. Your man-handful, and my man-handful are not the same, unfortunately. The part of the body that "can score" doesn't make sense. In the phrase "clear and obvious error", only the word "and" is not a subjective term. It's called a Gauge R&R in my world. Even the same referee would not make the same call for the same incident in the same match 90% of the time. Much less for a different referee, in a different match. The idea that it therefore needs to be precise to an armpit, is a bit pretentious in that context.
Imagine if goal line technology was supposed to discern the 'majority' of a ball over a line. Not a projection/graphic of a perfectly spherical ball either. The actual not-so-spherical ball in a video still.
It would probably be very contentious, no?
It's not a crisis. VAR is a good idea that is still working through the kinks. So while we hawk-eye, and bullet-time for body parts as if in the Matrix, unless we redefine some of the LOTG, there'll continue to be travesties to humanity seen wherever first, every damn week.
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| IFAB LOTG: |
The 'problem' VAR is facing in it's infancy, is that the laws haven't been adjusted to take advantage of it's obvious benefits. Offside? It should probably be worded just as balls going over lines are; the entire player should be offside. The offside rule was probably originally needed to prevent tactics of booting the ball to infinity as a form of counter-attacking, and teams essentially sitting in the lowest of defensive blocks to create the 'transition'. Being imprecise in definition also served as a built-in protection for the linesman; they could get pretty good at judging at least some portion of a player being past the last defender. The rule was probably not intended to measure Raheem Sterling's armpit or whatever else "can be used to score".
Handball? Maybe mimic the NFL and introduce a replay process that puts the onus on the coaches to be pedantic. Two decision-challenges per game per team. Handball probably needs to be defined as the player moving their hands towards the ball. Maybe only if the review shows that they did move their hand towards the ball in the box, there's a penalty kick. For all else (outside/inside the box and incidental handballs), indirect free-kick and of course the referee judges discipline.
Stopping the flow of the beloved game? Giving kids foamy-mouth nightmares because they celebrated a goal prematurely? Maybe limit how many angles and how many times the review is allowed to be done. Three angles in 15 total seconds once play is stopped, and 5 additional seconds to make a decision. Anything more only serves confirmation bias. Of course, and this should go without saying; show everyone what's being reviewed, and let the referee speak on the loud speaker. Again, just as in the NFL.
The 'problem' with VAR is that it is attempting to make subjective rules objective. It is not that the replay in of itself is inherently incapable. Your man-handful, and my man-handful are not the same, unfortunately. The part of the body that "can score" doesn't make sense. In the phrase "clear and obvious error", only the word "and" is not a subjective term. It's called a Gauge R&R in my world. Even the same referee would not make the same call for the same incident in the same match 90% of the time. Much less for a different referee, in a different match. The idea that it therefore needs to be precise to an armpit, is a bit pretentious in that context.
Imagine if goal line technology was supposed to discern the 'majority' of a ball over a line. Not a projection/graphic of a perfectly spherical ball either. The actual not-so-spherical ball in a video still.
It would probably be very contentious, no?
It's not a crisis. VAR is a good idea that is still working through the kinks. So while we hawk-eye, and bullet-time for body parts as if in the Matrix, unless we redefine some of the LOTG, there'll continue to be travesties to humanity seen wherever first, every damn week.
Want more? Go ahead and SUBSCRIBE to Football Rehab!
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