Is Football Getting Slower and More Fair?
The video assistant referee (VAR) is an assistant referee in association football who reviews decisions made by the head referee with the use of video footage and headset for communication.Following extensive trialling in a number of major competitions, VAR was first written into the Laws of the Game by the International Football Association Board (IFAB) in 2018. Operating under the philosophy of "minimal interference, maximum benefit", the VAR system seeks to provide a way for "clear and obvious errors" and "serious missed incidents" to be corrected. FIFA officially approved the use of VAR for the 2018 FIFA World Cup during the FIFA Council meeting on 16 March 2018 in Bogotá. This tournament became the first competition to use VAR in full (at all matches and in all venues).
When is VAR used?
GOALS
The role of the VAR is to assist the referee to determine whether there was an infringement that means a goal should not be awarded. As the ball has crossed the line, play is interrupted so there is no direct impact on the game.
PENALTY DECISIONS
The role of the VAR is to ensure that no clearly wrong decisions are made in conjunction with the award or non-award of a penalty kick.
RED CARD INCIDENTS
The role of the VAR is to ensure that no clearly wrong decisions are made in conjunction with sending off or not sending off a player.
MISTAKEN IDENTITY
The referee cautions or sends off the wrong player, or is unsure which player should be sanctioned. The VAR will inform the referee so that the correct player can be disciplined.
These stats were gathered by the International Football Association Board (IFAB) across a study of almost 972 games that took place in 20 different national authorities worldwide.Interestingly, across matches covered in the study, the system was only called into action in just third of the games. Approximately two-thirds of games did not revert to VAR at all, even though the facility was ready and waiting to be used. The breakdown is as follows:
- 69.1% of matches covered did not need VAR replays
- Only 5.5% of games where VAR was brought into play needed more than one review
- 57.4% of VAR incidents related to penalty decisions and goals scored
- 42.1% were in connection with red card situations
- Mistaken identity calls were negligible
In terms of the average VAR intervention time in a single match, it is approximately 55 seconds. This pales into insignificance with other match events such as:
- Corner kicks - 3 mins 57 secs
- Free kicks - 8 mins 51 secs
- Goal kicks - 5 mins 46 secs
- Making substitutions - 2 mins 57 secs
- Throw-ins - 7 mins 2 secs
With so many questionable decision made by VAR. Many fans and pundits were left baffled by VAR. Everyone believes in VAR but work is needed on implementation. VAR will not achieve 100 per cent accuracy, but will positively influence decision-making and lead to more correct, and fairer, judgments. In July 2020, the International Football Association Board (IFAB) transferred the responsibility of VAR to FIFA. IFAB will continue to work closely with FIFA, especially in terms of the VAR protocol, related Laws and qualification requirements. With two different sets of referee being involved in decision making and review. Mostly the decision made initially by field referee's are not changed. The VAR may advise the referee to change his decision, but the final call must always be the referee's. With increased use of the RRA(Referee Review Area), which will be used for subjective decisions in the three key areas -goals, red cards and penalty kicks. Decision made by referees won't be full of mistakes as compared to past season.
Who is in the VAR room?
There will be a lead official, who will make judgements on all reviews. There will also be an assistant official, who continues to watch the live game while the lead handles a review. The third person is the Hawk-eye operative, who controls the technology and is independent of the decision-making process.
Verdict
It's not perfect and there's been a few mistakes or perceived errors.Anything new that's brought into the game, there's going to be teething problems.A lot of the decisions are still subjective calls.So there's still a 50-50 on which way people go. Given time it'll come good, despite the criticism players and fans have now become more accustomed to it.
