VAR is there to uphold the laws of the game. Offside is rarely clear and obvious, it's black and white. The lines are calibrated and there's no tolerance allowed. If you're found to be offside, then you're offside.
There have been plenty of disputed VAR calls in other leagues. The VAR communication is available to the host broadcaster in the EPL and they often tell you what's been said. But if I'm watching on a crap stream with no sound in a pub, then broadcasting VAR communication won't help me understand anything. Nobody is stopping you celebrating, you decide whether to celebrate or not. The vast majority of goals we score are given, without VAR intervention. I've had to wait to celebrate before, I will have to again, but I would rather wait a minute to celebrate a valid goal, than celebrate a goal that clearly should not be given.
I'm sorry but the Robbo incident is a foul. He doesn't win the ball and he catches the forward. We saw them given before VAR, we've seen them given this season, we've seen them given for us this season. If that isn't given, then the ref has questions to answer. He needed one look at the monitor to inform himself of what happened to make his decision. Before, he could only have one look and take a guess, be it right or wrong. Whether you like it or not, at this level of the game, those days are over.
All match officials are there to uphold the LotG, not just VAR. VAR does have a specific remit which is to correct any clear and obvious errors made by on-field officials.
I don't think that the initial decision to not award a penalty was a clear and obvious error and therefore VAR should not have gotten involved. A number of former referrees have drawn the same conclusion. Noone is saying that it wasn't a foul - the question is about the process that the VAR went through which appears to be at odds with the published protocol of only correcting clear and obvious errors. Peter Walton said this too so this is not just me as a LFC fan saying it, a former elite referee with no allegience to the club has drawn the same conclusion.
Offsides are different and, yes, a player is either onside or offside.
As for accessing the VAR feed, the English broadcasters do not seem to be accessing it ... there was a lot of confusion and misinformation going around after the Everton game about what the VAR checked or didn't check and the reasoning behind it all and this all came from the broadcasters who were relying on Twitter posts from PGMOL and / or the EPL so, like I say, they don't seem to know about this.
Allowing fans to hear the conversation adds transparency and will help to educate fans too - the majority of VAR decisions are correct but because we don't know what they are looking for, it is hard for fans to always know why they are correct. Transparency is always a good thing and it is slightly archaic that the fans cannot hear these communications.
I fully agree that VAR is not going away and I don't want it to. It is not having anywhere near the same level of issues in other leagues so it is not VAR that is the issue, it is the officials using it that are the issue. Last season they did not do enough - there were hardly any instances where they asked a ref to look at a pitchside monitor. This season they are doing it too much ... it is still relatively new and still needs ironing out but in its current form in England, it is creating more problems than it is solving and it is not helping the game. The officials need to accept that the days of operating in secrecy are over: they need to understand that they need to be far more accountable and can no longer just hide in the shadows.
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