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Shots fired... VAR 0 Common Sense 1

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I'm 100% on board with keeping this away from VARs, but the article is either naive or disingenuous in a couple of places

"It has never been easier, in the history of football, to score a penalty kick than it is now," said BBC Sport pundit Pat Nevin.--Err, how much history does this guy know? It used to be that GKs had to be stationary until the ball was kicked, which was much more difficult than not moving forward. (Mind you, they weren't using a VAR to watch, but any of the violations in the WWC were easy to identify violations under the standards back in the day.

And that gets followed with Former Scotland Women's keeper Gemma Fay added: . . ."I think we're going to have this World Cup decided by VAR by inexperienced officials who haven't had the opportunity to work with this. Uh, no. The folks in the VAR booth are not inexperienced officials. Mostly they have VAR experience (which is why there are men as VARs, as women's leagues weren't using VR. But I guess that is a juicier allegation than that FIFA/IFAB made a mind boggling stupid decision to instruct VARs on zero tolerance.

Aside: I'd be curious when teams were told that this would be enforced this way. Any GK reading the laws (and not paying attention to the history of the last time GK movement was loosened) would have expected more latitude on this with the new Laws, not less.
 
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/48703852

Maybe a bit of common sense is prevailing??

This is not an official announcement according to David Elleray, as quoted in the Telegraph. As for the notion that the EPL and/or FA will have a policy of severely restricting the use of on-field reviews, when I queried this with the IFAB, I got the slightly cryptic response from the same source that:
what the papers say is not always entirely accurate
 
Aside: I'd be curious when teams were told that this would be enforced this way. Any GK reading the laws (and not paying attention to the history of the last time GK movement was loosened) would have expected more latitude on this with the new Laws, not less.
My understanding based on something I read just yesterday (sorry, but I can't recall the exact source) was that all the teams and especially the goalkeepers were specifically briefed in some detail as to the intended 'zero tolerance' policy on coming off the line, before the tournament started.
 
Have some people forgotten that a penalty kick is by design meant to be one of the harshest punishment handed to the defending team, sometimes for DOGSO and sometime for denying an obvious goal? Why are we looking for ways to make it easier for them to defend it illegally?
 
Have some people forgotten that a penalty kick is by design meant to be one of the harshest punishment handed to the defending team, sometimes for DOGSO and sometime for denying an obvious goal? Why are we looking for ways to make it easier for them to defend it illegally?
To be honest I think we are all agreed that significant GK encroachment (that might materially impact the outcome of the kick) should be punished. However the point at issue is whether negligible movement by the GK can / should be treated as trifling in the interests of 1) the spirit of the game and 2) not further sucking the life out of the viewing experience by stopping fans being able to unreservedly celebrate a penalty save ... as has already started to happen with goals from open play
 
Have some people forgotten that a penalty kick is by design meant to be one of the harshest punishment handed to the defending team, sometimes for DOGSO and sometime for denying an obvious goal? Why are we looking for ways to make it easier for them to defend it illegally?

Good call but it should be an equal battle. This should include encroachment too surely!
 
This should include encroachment too surely!
Yeah, but I think the VAR protocol on this has it about right - only if the encroaching player gets involved and affects play.

I also reckon the IFAB could be excused for thinking that this is a case of 'damned if you do and damned if you don't.'

In the past we used to get discussions about why referees were almost universally ignoring goalkeepers coming off the line, sometimes even by several feet. The blatant amounts of encroachment that keepers were getting away with, was something people used to complain about and obviously something the IFAB wanted to eliminate by a) changing the law and b) the way they've decided to enforce the new (and let's not forget, more lenient) provisions. So it's perhaps a little ironic that they're now getting criticised for making changes to prevent it and then actually enforcing those changes.

I've said this before but if, having changed the law on gk encroachment they then decided not to enforce it and let goalkeepers get away with exactly the same practices as before, they may as well not have bothered changing it in the first place.
 
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And that gets followed with Former Scotland Women's keeper Gemma Fay added: . . ."I think we're going to have this World Cup decided by VAR by inexperienced officials who haven't had the opportunity to work with this.

Also begs the question, “How are you supposed to become experienced without using it?”
 
Have some people forgotten that a penalty kick is by design meant to be one of the harshest punishment handed to the defending team, sometimes for DOGSO and sometime for denying an obvious goal? Why are we looking for ways to make it easier for them to defend it illegally?
PKs are also awarded for Acts of God, like HB which is not deliberate. Indeed for most offences, a PK does not match the crime and therefore should not have undeserved retakes to maintain the goal count and TV audience numbers
 
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Don't have your premier competition your first kick at the can?

but VAR has been in use for about 2 years now?

Yes, but only in men’s competitions, which is why there are so many men in the VR booth so that there is experience. (It will be interesting to see how many women’s leagues around the world, if any, have the financial resources to implement VR.) The issue on VR and PKs/GKs isn’t lack of experience by the VARs, it’s springing a new application of a rule on players at the highest level of competition.
 
Yes, but only in men’s competitions, which is why there are so many men in the VR booth so that there is experience. (It will be interesting to see how many women’s leagues around the world, if any, have the financial resources to implement VR.) The issue on VR and PKs/GKs isn’t lack of experience by the VARs, it’s springing a new application of a rule on players at the highest level of competition.
Don't forget -- referees dealing with having VAR for the first time ever.

The refs that have used VAR are having the shortest intervention stoppages and the most efficient usage.

The ones that haven't are costing (what feels like) 10+ minutes a match.
 
It's like they're there with the swords of Damocles just waiting for the slightest err just to justify their own existence and expenses!!
Lets stir up some **** because we can!!!
 
"Where are these referees doing their job week in, week out? It needs to be the best person for the job to give these players an opportunity to play their football. I want to talk about the football, not the VAR decisions."

These are the best female refs in the world. Is she saying it should be mostly male refs again at the world cup?
 
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