[Football] "It's not VAR, it's the people running it"

[Swansman]

It doesn't matter if the ball is travelling backwards, if you are ahead of the ball and there is only one opposition player between you and the goal line then you are in an offside position. I think the problem was that when the ball was passed across from the right, Coutinho was onside. As the ball travelled across, the defender moved forward putting Coutinho in an offside position however, I think the Lino thought there was another touch of the ball at that point, which there wasn't. Coutinho rang round to pick up the ball and that's when the Lino signalled and the ref stupidly blew the whistle. Had there been a second touch of the ball in the middle by a Villa player then it would have been offside. Unfortunately, once the ref blew the whistle, Man City players stopped and VAR could not get involved.

It is bizarre how in some case they allow play to continue when it is blatantly offside, eg Undav, and on others they flag straight away. Against Utd, we had a case where there was a close call for Welbeck and the flag went up immediately yet a similar instance involving a Utd player was allowed to carry on.

Bizarre yes but also kind of goes well along with the schizo fan/pundit take... when they wait with the flag, people are moaning about it, when they don't, people are also moaning about.

 

[drew]

Bizarre yes but also kind of goes well along with the schizo fan/pundit take... when they wait with the flag, people are moaning about it, when they don't, people are also moaning about.

There's quite a difference between 5 or 6 yrds offside and being virtually shoulder to shoulder with a defender.

 

[Guinness Boy]

Bizarre yes but also kind of goes well along with the schizo fan/pundit take... when they wait with the flag, people are moaning about it, when they don't, people are also moaning about.

They're only waiting / not waiting because VAR exists though. Without it you get a flag or no flag and you know that's it.

And offside also isn't a matter of fact necessarily. The fact we're playing Leicester at home today in late summer should remind folk on here of that.

 

[Javeaseagull]

It doesn't matter if the ball is travelling backwards, if you are ahead of the ball and there is only one opposition player between you and the goal line then you are in an offside position. I think the problem was that when the ball was passed across from the right, Coutinho was onside. As the ball travelled across, the defender moved forward putting Coutinho in an offside position however, I think the Lino thought there was another touch of the ball at that point, which there wasn't. Coutinho rang round to pick up the ball and that's when the Lino signalled and the ref stupidly blew the whistle. Had there been a second touch of the ball in the middle by a Villa player then it would have been offside. Unfortunately, once the ref blew the whistle, Man City players stopped and VAR could not get involved.

It is bizarre how in some case they allow play to continue when it is blatantly offside, eg Undav, and on others they flag straight away. Against Utd, we had a case where there was a close call for Welbeck and the flag went up immediately yet a similar instance involving a Utd player was allowed to carry on.

What do you mean it doesn't matter? Of course it does. It is only offside if the ball goes forward. That's why wingers, in the old days, went to the byline and crossed the ball. Everyone was onside.

 

[Eeyore]

I’d love to see a list a VAR decisions involving matches against the big 6 and which side benefitted…

There was one done a while back and there was no correlation. Big teams are not favoured.

The team who had most benefited was ...Brighton & Hove Albion.

 

[Swansman]

There was one done a while back and there was no correlation. Big teams are not favoured.

The team who had most benefited was ...Brighton & Hove Albion.

Wasn't that like two years ago? And most of the "benefit" was VAR ruling out pretty clear offside goals.

 

[Milano]

For me the crux of the problem is that the VAR is a current ref. That’s open to all sorts of peer pressure. I don’t understand why it isn’t a pathway for experienced refs when they are no longer fit enough to actually be in the middle anymore.

I also agree that play acting (cheating) needs to be addressed, for example I’d like to see Mendy given a retrospective one match ban for his acting yesterday.

 

[drew]

What do you mean it doesn't matter? Of course it does. It is only offside if the ball goes forward. That's why wingers, in the old days, went to the byline and crossed the ball. Everyone was onside.

https://www.thefa.com/football-rules-governance/lawsandrules/laws/football-11-11/law-11---offside

Read it.

(also, if the winger is at the goal line, not the byline whatever that is, then by default everyone is behind the ball!!)

 

[dazzer6666]

Exactly, let's call it for what it is, poor quality referees, on and off the pitch. People refer to VAR as if it's some kind of artificial intelligence. It's not, it's the likes of Lee Mason and Mike Dean watching a replay and still coming to wrong decisions. The ref to 'clear and obvious' doesn't help so bin that.

Personally think the Forest pen shouldn't have been given, far to close and his arms were not outstretched.

Re the Forest pen, I'm not actually bothered about the actual decision (def one of those that could be debated forever), I'm more just pleased that Oliver refused to bow to the VAR 'expert'.

 

[Official Old Man]

I think I'm the only person, except the VAR team, who think it was a foul on the Chelsea keeper. Once again it's a case of 'would it be given outside the box as a foul?'. I believe it would as the player clearly keeps his left leg down to knudge the keeper. At that point it is a foul and free kick. But as the ref didn't see it the keeper then acts the fool and rolls about on the floor dieing in a shamefull way. I also believe the keeper could have been booked for simulation in his behaviour. He made the mistake of parrying the ball to the opposition to score and instantly decided to act around injured. But the first move was the left leg dragging across his chest lightly but intentionally.

 

[A1X]

English officials are shite, VAR just exposes it. You can take away or keep VAR, I don’t mind. I’d much rather we fixed the problem of terrible quality officiating in this country. It’s the elephant in the room nobody (at least in a position to be heard) seems to mention, but there is a reason why, despite being one of the major footballing nations, we don’t have any officials going to Qatar and didn’t have any going to Russia.

 

[drew]

English officials are shite, VAR just exposes it. You can take away or keep VAR, I don’t mind. I’d much rather we fixed the problem of terrible quality officiating in this country. It’s the elephant in the room nobody (at least in a position to be heard) seems to mention, but there is a reason why, despite being one of the major footballing nations, we don’t have any officials going to Qatar and didn’t have any going to Russia.

Agree with you although we do have officials at Qatar!!

https://www.englandfootball.com/art...l be represented by,named by FIFA on Thursday.

 

[Milano]

Re the Forest pen, I'm not actually bothered about the actual decision (def one of those that could be debated forever), I'm more just pleased that Oliver refused to bow to the VAR 'expert'.

For me there is nothing wrong with the ref going to have a look if the VAR and the ref have different opinions, I agree it’s important that doesn’t automatically mean use the VAR decision. If it’s close or contentious then the original decision should stand, similar to cricket.

 

[Harry Wilson's tackle]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/62783142

Huge number of controversial / incorrect decisions again yesterday. Offside inconsistencies too over the last two game sets. Everton's goal not flagged but (correctly) given offside by VAR, Coutinho flagged when onside, rather than allowed to continue and play whistled dead so VAR could not correct it and, in our game, Undav not flagged when 10 yards off.

We still have controversy. We still have incorrect decisions. We still have managers blaming refs and sent to the stands. Nothing has been fixed yet fans can't celebrate a goal properly and are getting home from games later and later. Five minutes to award and take a penalty at Forest.

Keep goal line tech but as for VAR, get rid.

Won't happen.

And.....they simply need to get better officials, not the clowns currently running the show.

You may as well advocate that, since the referees keep whistling at the wrong moment, they ban the Acme Thunderer.

 

[Harry Wilson's tackle]

English officials are shite, VAR just exposes it. You can take away or keep VAR, I don’t mind. I’d much rather we fixed the problem of terrible quality officiating in this country. It’s the elephant in the room nobody (at least in a position to be heard) seems to mention, but there is a reason why, despite being one of the major footballing nations, we don’t have any officials going to Qatar and didn’t have any going to Russia.

This.

As Shearer said last night, it isn't the VAR. So why is the OP advocating removal of VAR?

It's a bit like saying because the police banged up the wrong people for the Guildford pub bombing we should relax the laws about terrorism.

 

[Swansman]

English officials are shite, VAR just exposes it. You can take away or keep VAR, I don’t mind. I’d much rather we fixed the problem of terrible quality officiating in this country. It’s the elephant in the room nobody (at least in a position to be heard) seems to mention, but there is a reason why, despite being one of the major footballing nations, we don’t have any officials going to Qatar and didn’t have any going to Russia.

According to people all around the world, their officials are also shite so unfortunately there's no good refs on the planet. How do you fix that problem?

 

[Javeaseagull]

https://www.thefa.com/football-rules-governance/lawsandrules/laws/football-11-11/law-11---offside

Read it.

(also, if the winger is at the goal line, not the byline whatever that is, then by default everyone is behind the ball!!)

So you do not know what I mean when I say byline? OK. You are right that the bit you quoted does not mention the direction of the ball. Well done. If you do not know that the ball must be passed forward for anyone to be offside I can't help you.

 

[portlock seagull]

What you don’t see on MoTD is these checks are taking 5+mins to do. Talk about killing the game. Especially when they’re also wrong!

 

[Seagull58]

Now its here, its not going away. If it did every week would just be 'that mistake wouldn't have happened if we still had VAR'

It just needs to be used correctly and ideally transparently. PGMOL just hide and try to protect their officials, but it would actually help players, managers, fans and ultimately referees too if there was a little more openness in the process.

This is my view. VAR is here to stay and does correct some incorrect refereeing decisions. The problem is almost entirely down to poor referees and poor VAR officials. A secondary problem imo is the clear and obvious threshold.

 

[Seagull58]

According to people all around the world, their officials are also shite so unfortunately there's no good refs on the planet. How do you fix that problem?

Foreign referees in the European matches are clearly much better than the EPL refs.