2023/24 Season

[Exiled_red]

Yaaa might be recency bias, but I think this season has been the worst officiating ever. Even apart from the massive calls, things like stupid yellows for taking a 5 seconds to take a throw in, when it’s clearly not tactical time wasting, or yellows for waving imaginary cards etc.

With all the big calls, it’s var that I’m annoyed with more than the on field ref- the ref can make a mistake, but when your watching it back on video, it’s inexcusable… and what really annoys me is the way the rules are written- like “clear and obvious”. I feel like that’s there as a get out of jail card for the officials. “Ohhh we got the wrong call, no because it wasn’t clear and obvious…” also the lack of transparency. We should be able to hear them live, but at the very least we should get some sort of referee/var report after the game. We’ve been using var for 5 years now, we shouldn’t still be ironing out the wrinkles.

Also I think the media is partly to blame- they don’t hold them accountable at all. They amount of bull**** articles about Trent saying our success meant more to our fans, but noones doing any sort of detailed analysis on refereeing standards.

I don't like the time wasting and associated faffing around but it's mad that you can put your studs into someones chest, not even win the the ball and not get booked but taking 20seconds to take a throw gets you a yellow.

The thing that annoys me most about VAR is that it's not about getting the decisions right, if it reviews them it should get them right, accepting that it's wrong, but not wrong enough to do anything about is stupid.

I also don't get how they know a decision has been given because the ref saw it but didn't deem it a foul, or he just didn't see it.

[peterbread]

Yaaa might be recency bias, but I think this season has been the worst officiating ever. Even apart from the massive calls, things like stupid yellows for taking a 5 seconds to take a throw in, when it’s clearly not tactical time wasting, or yellows for waving imaginary cards etc.

With all the big calls, it’s var that I’m annoyed with more than the on field ref- the ref can make a mistake, but when your watching it back on video, it’s inexcusable… and what really annoys me is the way the rules are written- like “clear and obvious”. I feel like that’s there as a get out of jail card for the officials. “Ohhh we got the wrong call, no because it wasn’t clear and obvious…” also the lack of transparency. We should be able to hear them live, but at the very least we should get some sort of referee/var report after the game. We’ve been using var for 5 years now, we shouldn’t still be ironing out the wrinkles.

Also I think the media is partly to blame- they don’t hold them accountable at all. They amount of bull**** articles about Trent saying our success meant more to our fans, but noones doing any sort of detailed analysis on refereeing standards.

Is it time officials need to do press conferences or something after games to be asked questions and held accountable for their decisions? Players and managers get all sorts but refs are so overly protected. I don’t know if it would help or be worth while but something needs to be done to improve the standards and also some accountability needs to be taken, not a token we’re sorry that does nothing. Players and managers careers can be massively affected by bad decisions.

[Cerbie]

Is it time officials need to do press conferences or something after games to be asked questions and held accountable for their decisions? Players and managers get all sorts but refs are so overly protected. I don’t know if it would help or be worth while but something needs to be done to improve the standards and also some accountability needs to be taken, not a token we’re sorry that does nothing. Players and managers careers can be massively affected by bad decisions.

They have a multimillion pound system solely designed to protect them when it could easily be used for making the right call instead but their precious little egos could deal with them being wrong apparently.

Post match interviews would be a step forward but they just need to mike the *******s up so the calls are transparent.

[DerKrampus]

VAR refereeing and actual referees should be two non-interacting branches so they're effectively strangers and their decisions aren't effected by familiarity.

[S-RED]

VAR refereeing and actual referees should be two non-interacting branches so they're effectively strangers and their decisions aren't effected by familiarity.

100% & i believe thats being implemented, but 1:3 years too late & 2: taking way too long to set up.

[danperkins]

VAR refereeing and actual referees should be two non-interacting branches so they're effectively strangers and their decisions aren't effected by familiarity.

[Exiled_red]

They have a multimillion pound system solely designed to protect them when it could easily be used for making the right call instead but their precious little egos could deal with them being wrong apparently.

Post match interviews would be a step forward but they just need to mike the *******s up so the calls are transparent.

I don't think they need to do interviews if they allow people to hear the communication between the ref and the VAR, that's what everyone else wants there is then no ambiguity in what has happened.

One big thing that annoys me at the moment is there is no way to know if an on field ref fails to give a decision because he saw it and doesn't see it as a foul or he didn't see it at all. VAR seems to assume that it is always the former case

[Kenneth]

Good point

[Norbs]

VAR refereeing and actual referees should be two non-interacting branches so they're effectively strangers and their decisions aren't effected by familiarity.

Need more women refs too as from what I've seen there doesn't seem to be cronies among them

[Norbs]

I don't think they need to do interviews if they allow people to hear the communication between the ref and the VAR, that's what everyone else wants there is then no ambiguity in what has happened.

One big thing that annoys me at the moment is there is no way to know if an on field ref fails to give a decision because he saw it and doesn't see it as a foul or he didn't see it at all. VAR seems to assume that it is always the former case

Not sure about that, if there is a foul and the ref doesn't give it then it implies the latter doesn't it? Either way, removing the 'clear and obvious error' and changing it to 'failure to notice an infringement' would suddenly put far more pressure on the VAR to make the correct decision. Failure after that could be examined and then the line of questioning could begin.

Let's face it, refs have a really difficult job. The best form of help for them would be for another pair of eyes to rectify their mistakes. Their egos can't surely be that fragile that they can't be advised that they've missed something. If their egos are that fragile then we need a complete overhaul of refs in order to replace them with ones with thicker skin

[Mr Pink]

Not sure about that, if there is a foul and the ref doesn't give it then it implies the latter doesn't it? Either way, removing the 'clear and obvious error' and changing it to 'failure to notice an infringement' would suddenly put far more pressure on the VAR to make the correct decision. Failure after that could be examined and then the line of questioning could begin.

Let's face it, refs have a really difficult job. The best form of help for them would be for another pair of eyes to rectify their mistakes. Their egos can't surely be that fragile that they can't be advised that they've missed something. If their egos are that fragile then we need a complete overhaul of refs in order to replace them with ones with thicker skin

Yaaa everyone talks about rugby, but there’s so many other sports world wide that use some sort of video review- I know all the American ones do, and I’m sure plenty other in different countries have. Footballs the only sport I’ve heard of, which has the “clear and obvious” nonsense. Any other it’s about what is the right decision full stop- not about is it wrong enough to be clear and obvious. Think I’ve said it in the refereeing thread months ago- I honestly feel like they put that in place to introduce a grey area. Pundits etc can say definitively what they think is a foul or not, but how can anyone argue where the line is for whether something is clear and obvious. It gives them that band where a decision can be criticized.

I also think the refs should give some sort of press conference, or even a public match report. I think people would see the human side and be a bit more forgiving of mistakes. Also, taking the one the other day as example, we have pundits saying it wasn’t given cos Roku got the ball first (he didn’t), because penalties have a higher bar than fouls outside the box(they shouldn’t), because it wasn’t a clear and obvious error (it was), etc. it would be good for us/pundits to know the reason a decision was or was not given so we can at least know what to be critical of, instead of guessing why.

[Cerbie]

Not sure about that, if there is a foul and the ref doesn't give it then it implies the latter doesn't it? Either way, removing the 'clear and obvious error' and changing it to 'failure to notice an infringement' would suddenly put far more pressure on the VAR to make the correct decision. Failure after that could be examined and then the line of questioning could begin.

Let's face it, refs have a really difficult job. The best form of help for them would be for another pair of eyes to rectify their mistakes. Their egos can't surely be that fragile that they can't be advised that they've missed something. If their egos are that fragile then we need a complete overhaul of refs in order to replace them with ones with thicker skin

I like that idea.

[Exiled_red]

Not sure about that, if there is a foul and the ref doesn't give it then it implies the latter doesn't it? Either way, removing the 'clear and obvious error' and changing it to 'failure to notice an infringement' would suddenly put far more pressure on the VAR to make the correct decision. Failure after that could be examined and then the line of questioning could begin.

Let's face it, refs have a really difficult job. The best form of help for them would be for another pair of eyes to rectify their mistakes. Their egos can't surely be that fragile that they can't be advised that they've missed something. If their egos are that fragile then we need a complete overhaul of refs in order to replace them with ones with thicker skin

I wouldn't say that it implies he hasn't seen it, if that were the case going over to the monitor would be a sensible thing to do, so that he does see it once.

Say the Doku-MacAllister incident MacAllister has his back fully to the referee, what the referee sees is the back of MacAllister Doku challenge and the ball go up in the air, he almost certainly won't have seen where MacAllister was caught, how high Doku's foot was and who played the ball. In that situation what he sees isn't what has happened, he is filling in the gaps (correctly or incorrectly). If the referee is side on looking at MacAllister's face he sees a different incident. The VAR can guess what the ref has seen. What I don’t get is how VAR know if the ref waves play on or get up to MacAllister is that because he has seen the foul fully and doesn't think it's a pen or he has partially seen it and from what he has seen he doesn't think it's a pen. In signaling something that implies he has seen the incident and VAR can't intervene, if he doesn't signal that probably implies the hasn't seen it, but that rarely happens.

[Norbs]

Yaaa everyone talks about rugby, but there’s so many other sports world wide that use some sort of video review- I know all the American ones do, and I’m sure plenty other in different countries have. Footballs the only sport I’ve heard of, which has the “clear and obvious” nonsense. Any other it’s about what is the right decision full stop- not about is it wrong enough to be clear and obvious. Think I’ve said it in the refereeing thread months ago- I honestly feel like they put that in place to introduce a grey area. Pundits etc can say definitively what they think is a foul or not, but how can anyone argue where the line is for whether something is clear and obvious. It gives them that band where a decision can be criticized.

I also think the refs should give some sort of press conference, or even a public match report. I think people would see the human side and be a bit more forgiving of mistakes. Also, taking the one the other day as example, we have pundits saying it wasn’t given cos Roku got the ball first (he didn’t), because penalties have a higher bar than fouls outside the box(they shouldn’t), because it wasn’t a clear and obvious error (it was), etc. it would be good for us/pundits to know the reason a decision was or was not given so we can at least know what to be critical of, instead of guessing why.

Correct me if I'm wrong but I don't think all of football had this clear and obvious ****, it's just our lot of cronies

[Exiled_red]

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