VAR at Southampton

Quoted from Poojah

All isn’t really an option, given the cost of the infrastructure involved to service VAR. But using it only where both sides are in the Premier League seems fair and sensible.

The issue with VAR is that it brings an extreme level of scrutiny that players aren’t used to in League Two and the like. Routine shirt pulls that are fair game in the lower leagues are all of a sudden penalty inducing. Players will have to adapt their game accordingly, which requires a layer of conscious thought that is yet another disadvantage when coming up against more talented, quicker thinking players.

There may be a sense of inequality between the show courts and lesser ones of Wimbledon, but technologies like Hawkeye don’t change the way players think and play - they just aid very close decisions. For me, VAR can only work against non-PL teams who are not used to playing with it week-in, week-out, and I’d be very surprised if we come out on the right side of any key, video assisted decisions a week on Wednesday.

It's a good point but if we're playing at this level we have to accept the things that come with this level. To use the tennis analogy we're on Centre Court when we don't even normally get past the qualifiers.

Quoted from promotion plaice

If Southampton score against us and it goes to VAR and is ruled out for offside I doubt many of us will be complaining about VAR.

It is what it is.

Correct the nature of the beast  as i see it the PL  have it all the time us on the lower leagues can sometimes get away with murder shirt pulls etc ,because the Ref and "Lineo's" should have gone to specsavers.
GTFC  have 3 homes and over a week before we invade the South Coast hopefull Paul and the team have had a coffee over this.
UTM.

VAR in general I think is needed, but we are in a transition period, like with anything, where there will be problems to iron out in due course. To get VAR up to standard then that transition period is a necessary evil.

However, in terms of some games having it and some not, or even having it in a competition where teams compete that don't regularly use it, I fundamentally disagree. It is a different game with VAR in use. Whether that's the way it should be or not is up for debate, but that is the way it is.

EFL Clubs play a completely different way to premiership clubs, and a lot of it is down to the elements in the equation. For example, holding at corners, diving, etc. Yes, all of this is technically 'cheating', but if that's a part of a teams game used successfully throughout the season, and more poignantly in 1 round, then it should be the same in another round.

Prem clubs have the advantage of familiarity with the technology and the elements of decision making in the game, so I only see this benefiting them.

Quoted from RobDef1

VAR in general I think is needed, but we are in a transition period, like with anything, where there will be problems to iron out in due course. To get VAR up to standard then that transition period is a necessary evil.

However, in terms of some games having it and some not, or even having it in a competition where teams compete that don't regularly use it, I fundamentally disagree. It is a different game with VAR in use. Whether that's the way it should be or not is up for debate, but that is the way it is.

EFL Clubs play a completely different way to premiership clubs, and a lot of it is down to the elements in the equation. For example, holding at corners, diving, etc. Yes, all of this is technically 'cheating', but if that's a part of a teams game used successfully throughout the season, and more poignantly in 1 round, then it should be the same in another round.

Prem clubs have the advantage of familiarity with the technology and the elements of decision making in the game, so I only see this benefiting them.

It's been around 5 years and it's now worse than it was when it came in. That's more than enough time to iron out teething problems. The issues are fundamental and the solution is staring us in the face.

Quoted from Mariner_09

It's been around 5 years and it's now worse than it was when it came in. That's more than enough time to iron out teething problems. The issues are fundamental and the solution is staring us in the face.

Ok, so what is that solution? Scrap it? Because this thread would suggest it is still up for debate, which would suggest we haven't reached a definitive solution at all.

I also disagree that it is worse now than when it first came in.

I think it has been correct an overwhelmingly more amount of times than incorrect, but of course only incorrect or dubious decisions are noted.

Quoted from RobDef1

Ok, so what is that solution? Scrap it? Because this thread would suggest it is still up for debate, which would suggest we haven't reached a definitive solution at all.

I also disagree that it is worse now than when it first came in.

I think it has been correct an overwhelmingly more amount of times than incorrect, but of course only incorrect or dubious decisions are noted.

I honestly believe the solution is to use it more sparingly, only in the event of decisions that are so categorically wrong they need to be corrected (y’know, like not sending off a goalkeeper for saving a goal-bound shot 5 yards outside of his box, or allowing a big nosed, scouse striker to punch the ball into the back of the net), avoid re-referring marginal decisions and allow football to be perfectly imperfect.

But that will never happen.

I personally think we need an 'Umpire's Call' kind of thing for offsides. When VAR has spent 5 minutes pissing around drawing lines which show that a defender's toe was probably playing the attacker on, it doesn't really help the flow of the game much. If the incident looks level to the naked eye and without drawing any fancy lines, call it onside. Before VAR, if you had seen a shot on camera which showed the players level, there wouldn't have been any complaints about a toe, or a heel or whatever playing them on or offside.

It would mean fewer goals were denied for offside and should mean the benefit returns to the teams on the front foot.

VAR can be helpful for checking for blatant fouls missed in the lead up to goals (unless the VAR officials miss them as well!) and also for clocking serious foul play which might have been missed by the officials, so it still has a use, but the interminable delays you often see don't help the spectacle of the game.

I think it should be scrapped completely (it's shit), but as that's not going to happen, we'll just have to think of next week as good preparation for our first Premier League season later this decade.

I tend to agree that VAR probably favours the PL side over an L2 team, but let's not get too hung up about it.

A bigger advantage for the PL side is that all their players will be better than all the players in the L2 team they're up against.  

Southampton will need to have on 'off night' or VAR isn't going to be a significant factor. And if we're to stay in the game it will
require tons of pressing and pressurizing by Town ... maybe VAR will provide a few breathers for us!

For me, VAR sucks. I'd scrap it completely.
I used to tell myself that diabolical refereeing decisions were due to the ref having just one sight of the incident, and only a few
seconds to decide how to call it.

Depressingly, VAR has shown that our game is too often officiated by idiots. VAR and the idiots are here to stay though...  

As VAR is assumed to assist the premiership clubs as they are used to it , I bet the ref appointed will be a premiership ref. Now some would say that’s because there the best, in my opinion that is debatable, but again it helps the premiership club as we all know how every challenge is always a free kick to which ever player screams and rolls about more, whereas our cloggers in league 2 still see the  physical side of the game as something you have to win.