VAR.
Three simple letters, but they stir up a lot of emotions from football fans, and have been doing so this season.
Sheffield United are a club that can feel particularly aggrieved over the whole thing, as this article from March pointed out that the Blades have been the worst affected team in the league when it comes to the decision-makers, with a negative eight differential when it comes to calls going for or against us.
So it is no surprise to see that Blades fans haven’t exactly been too happy when it comes to the electronic measures.
Are you a fan of VAR?
Yes
No
And when @Blades1889_com asked fans on social media yesterday which VAR decision has annoyed them the most this season, they had plenty of examples that they could call upon to voice their frustrations, but there was one incident in particular that stood out above the rest.
Spurs, City, Southampton at home. Lists endless for us & Wolves. One that went for us was a bit of alright tho 👌
— Dani Bryan (@DaniBryan89) May 20, 2020
Spurs, still get angry when I think about it now. Was fractionally off, if at all, and in a different phase of play 🤬🤬🤬
— Maddog1889⚔ (@Maddog1889) May 20, 2020
Definitely Spurs terrible decision ☹️.
— Gary 🔴⚪️🔴⚪️⚔️⚔️ (@gazza4666) May 20, 2020
The big nail of the toe, actually 👍
— Steve McGuiness (@Mac1965) May 20, 2020
That’s like asking me to pick my favourite child! Hate VAR and every decision it’s made whether it’s been right or wrong
— KathyR50 (@KathyRonson) May 20, 2020
Spurs. Wasn’t offside in the first place, wrong phase of play, absolutely shambolic
— Jon Davies (@1JonDavies1988) May 20, 2020
There have in fact been some reports suggesting that VAR could be gotten rid of in the latter stages of this season, although that’s not something I’d be a fan of personally.
If they are going to make calls like a players toenail being offside they better get the technology spot on. And at the moment it isn’t.
They cannot tell if a player is so minutely offside because the absolute micro millisecond it takes for somebody’s toenail to be offside cannot be measured against the absolute micro millisecond that the player who passed to him actually touched the ball.
Because we are talking about the shortest period of time possible to measure ( the absolute milli milli milli second the passing player touched the ball) it is impossible to gauge such minuscule decisions accurately enough.
VAR is a good idea, but if the ref and lino see nothing wrong VAR shouldn’t be involved. It should only be used if the officials aren’t sure, and only if they ask for it.
The ref and linesman saw nothing wrong at Spurs, but If they weren’t sure and asked for help from VAR I think they’d have still given the goal even after seeing it, this is because some commonxsense would have come into play.
And what’s everybody saying we got a good VAR decision against Man Utd for ?
The ref and linesman gave the goal, VAR just confirmed that McBurnie didn’t handle the ball.
We could have only got a good VAR decision if the goal had been disallowed and then the referees decision was overturned by VAR