VAR RECCURING ERRORS: “WHO IS AT FAULT? THE TECHNOLOGY OR PGMOL OFFICIALS?”. I think to unpack this debacle that we have come to normalized as natural occurrence similar to daily human mistakes, errors by PGMOL officials as seen in almost all game week in the EPL, VAR is simply defined as “Video Assisted Referee”. To break this further, it is officiating a football match using technology i.e video replays, images etc to spot obvious and clear errors committed by the on-field human officials usually 4 personnel or actions sanctioned by the rules as fouls that were completely missed by the on-field officials. For VAR to be effective and not seen as in direct conflict or undermining the authorities of the on-field referees, certain parameters of the game state were defined as areas VAR can intervene like DOGSCO, dangerous play, incidents in the penalty box, violent conducts by players and these activities were categorized into 4 major areas i.e goals (and the attacking phase leading to them), penalties (awarded or missed), direct red cards, and mistaken identity. Now that we have defined VAR and clarified the intended use of VAR, how is it possible that a technology deployed to spot clear and obvious errors made by on-field officials somehow end up with recurring errors that lead to controversies, major talking points post-match every week and in most cases deciding the outcome of football matches? I am Arsenal fan so let’s use Arsenal specific VAR incidents as an example. 3 seasons ago at Newcastle, 3 separate incidents and VAR were unable to spot any. One of the incidents was if the ball had crossed the line. Subjective as at that time because VAR had no camera at the corner flag and no spider camera to confirm if the entire ball had crossed the line. Fast track to this season and at Nottingham Forest, a defender clearly used his hand to control the ball from going into corner kick. There was a camera at the corner, and we all saw that deliberate handball. Juxtaposing both incidents, VAR error at Newcastle had been effectively addressed with a camera at the corner at Nottingham Forest but yet outcome was the same. Arsenal this season at Brighton, Arsenal player deliberately holding a Brighton player in the box during an attacking play missed by the referee but no VAR intervention. At Mancity, an Arsenal player engaging in a violent act but was issued a yellow card instead of a red card. Both actions had no VAR error but officials’ wrong interpretation of the Rules and wrong decision. Typically, most OEMs and other manufacturers usually issue a warning and a recall of their products once that notice significant factory defect or recurring manufacturing errors to their products and such products are withdrawn within weeks, months or sometimes within a year. Before doing this, the OEM go through a process of investigation to determine the root cause, issue a notice to their customers and users and proceed to a remedy phase where repairs and replacements are undertaken. The question now is if VAR (technology) is the problem, who are the OEM of EPL VAR and why have no one asked the OEM to undertake this process of stopping this recurring errors? How come none of the media platforms in the UK ever done any kind of hit piece, editorial or investigative journalism on the recurring errors of the technology? Rather, we have an independent panel that review VAR errors, we have a Skysports PGMOL show where the Head of PGMOL do a review of the VAR errors weekly as well as other controversial officiating decisions, we have another Skysports show where ex-referee do a review of VAR good or bad calls, Talksports have similar radio shows, Ex-Referees have podcasts and Youtube Channels talking about VAR errors and we have media platforms doing annual reports like the one done by BBC, The Athletic and now ESPN doing VAR errors and impact on clubs, title races and relegation battles.

FOOTBALL WOKENESS CULTURE: Rivals banter, bitterness, hatred and tribalism masked as professional football discussion. The new EPL season does not start until mid August. Before that there is the World Cup starting in 9 days, summer transfer deals, players recovering from the World Cup and all other pre-season issues. I get that some guys like to hang out and discuss their views on the EPL teams but an appropriate discussion point today could be a review of the just concluded season, review of the just concluded UCL, players to watch out for in the World Cup and potential winners etc. To start having an EPL prediction in June is somehow weird and wrong timing especially by ex-players that understand the dynamics of the game. The other thing aside the premature conversation is the logical explanation of how a club that just won the league, lost the UCL on penalties, have the only stable management among top6 clubs and a very healthy finances to strengthen the squad will finish 4th? You can project your own pain, bitterness towards your rivals successes and disappointment of your clubs failures by wishing your club have a good season but I think such discussions can be private with your buddies and close associates but not on a public platform. These kind of comical, clownish views from pundits, ex- footballers and football writers on major media platforms fuels the football wokeness culture amongst younger generations and some older generation football fans. This needs to stop. nitter.cf/goodbadftblpod/status/…