RateTheRef

Quote from: Whistleblower on Sun 29 Nov 2020 11:17

VAR are turning these tight offside situations into a farce and I suggest bringing the game into disrepute. This is what I think needs to happen and happen fast.
 It is stated unequivocally that level is ONSIDE. I would issue guidance which employs a generous definition of level and which states that being level is defined as any part of the torsos overlapping. Personally I always thought the "daylight" convention was a perfectly sensible one.

Let us go back to first principles as to why there is an offside rule in the first place. Surely it was there so ensure that the match moved up and down the pitch without attackers parking themselves in the opponents half in an opportunistic way. It was not designed to rule out an attacker's toe being marginally further to the goal than a defender's because the principle is still adhered to. Extremely tight offside calls ( even with the use of technology which is, of course, not fool proof ) should favour the attacker.

I agree with you about the principle of why the offside law was introduced, but I guess the challenge is how you effectively incorporate that into a more precise form of measurement that is now used.

Tight offsides with VAR are nothing new. I remember Juan Mata having a goal disallowed for Man Utd at Huddersfield in February 2018, nearly three years ago. I've consistently said that I won't criticise an individual VAR for an offside offside decision or complain about a particular one that is made (unless it's shown to be 100% wrong, like if they missed a defender further back etc.) - we've basically had the example of what might happen and it then just becomes a matter of time before a similar case inevitably repeats itself. I'm sure it will happen many more times before the end of the season and the same cycle of discussion will be replicated.

There are two possible developments that IFAB/FIFA are looking into as far as I'm aware:

The first relates to making the judgement of offside automated rather than requiring VAR to plot points and draw lines. This seems highly likely to come in, probably in the next two years before 2022 World Cup. This would see decisions made much more quickly (I think the 2-3 minute wait for an offside is one of the biggest problems) but obviously would still have pretty tight measurements.

The second is the idea, discussed previously on here, that if any part of the attacker is level with the second-last defender, they are instead judged onside. I believe this is currently being trialled. Arsene Wenger advocated this approach but I think has since voiced the concern it might give too much of an advantage to the striker. There's also the question of how easy/difficult this is to judge without VAR. I think it will probably take longer for such a fundamental law change to be considered and approved.

Are they also looking at the fact that, with ARs not flagging immediately that a player is offside, there have been several instances of play continuing and the offending side winning corners as a result. This is now happening more than I have ever known and it must be relevant to the instructions given that, should a goal be scored or a penalty awarded, then VAR will check for offside. It is not good enough and, yet again, I feel sorry for the officials who a re being restricted from doing their job.