Who was the better defense? Argentina’s goalie, Or VAR?
Their goalie put in work no doubt, but VAR was there to back him up. They got that goal during main time, but thanks to VAR (Video Assistant Referee) they determined the scoring player was off sides by 1” (not an exaggeration).
Not claiming VAR is perfect or that FIFA isn’t full of shit weasels, but isn’t having more cameras (in professional sports games) just objectively better? The refs on the field are still extremely important, but they can’t be omnipotent, so if necessary then why deny them access to dozens of different angles to confirm what really happened at any given time?
Back during the Cold War, the Stasi and KGB had a strategy. You observe everything and log everything.
When someone you like breaks the rules, you see it, and you ignore it. When someone you don’t like breaks the rules, you see it and you bring the hammer down.
There is no person and no sporting event that doesn’t ever break a rule. But if you start selectively using those rules to punish one side and ignore the other, then you’re just discriminating with cameras. You’re not judging fairly anymore.
Like I said, I don’t think they’re being used perfectly, no. And I think you’re right that they can indeed be used in a negative/unfair way. But I do still believe that having the multi-cam option is a good thing for a professional sporting event. I don’t know the exact rules on how they’re used in FIFA (so feel free to call me out here), but if I had to guess, I think it’s similar to the use of the review box in American Football: the refs on the field make a call, if it’s disputed or if they need more info then they go to the cameras, but ultimately the human beings on the field have the final say. Obviously I didn’t watch every World Cup match, but I don’t recall ever seeing a moment where the VAR stopped play and made a call on its own that every ref on the field had missed. Sports commentators might have seen/talked about something like that, saying that the refs SHOULD have picked up on something, but at the end of the day it’s still humans making the initial calls and the cameras are just there to provide evidence.
I mean yes it’s a tool, but it does come down to how the tool is used and in this cup, it’s been abused.
Egypt and Norway lost due to controversial VAR calls annulling goals.
It’s been used to push favorites.
And despite microchips in balls, and VAR, they still have shit calls like ignoring that the ball hit a camera wire in the Norway vs England match which should have been a dead ball.
Like I said, I agree that they’re not perfect yet (and probably never will be, but that’s a whole other matter). But I still don’t think you should throw out the baby with the bath water when they can provide a great benefit for the actual refs on the field who simply can’t be everywhere at once. I greatly appreciate you providing some links/examples though where most people (not necessarily in this thread but across the internet) simply rely on the age-old “just trust me bro”. At the end of the day, I still think more cameras are an overall benefit, it’s just a matter of working out how to better integrate them, and by providing examples of how they’re misused we can better figure that out, so thank you 👍
I’m not a football hooligan or whatever the preferred term is, but IMO there’s nothing wrong with good humans making the occasional mistake. Use video for verifying red cards when someone’s pretending they’ve just been stabbed, but for stuff the human on the field should be expected to see, a little disagreeable calls because they’re human feels better than disagreeable calls because the computer said they were 1 inch offsides.
The problem the becomes are the bad or missed calls because they are human, or because the fix is in? That same worry happens with VAR. But it’s reviewable and so bad calls are more easily noticed, and identifying trends is easier.
Sadly not everyone agrees with you on that one (though I’m mostly on your side here). I’ve seen plenty of people argue ‘Oh the refs should’ve seen that’ despite being all the way across the field or ‘Oh the judges really should know what the cards do’ in a TCG with literally tens of thousands of cards in print, or ‘the ump should have called that a strike, look it’s catching the corner’ as if they don’t realize that the graphics they see on TV are not actually visible above the plate, or other similarly-ludicrous takes. Honestly it’s a little scary how infallible the ‘deciders’ are meant to be in these situations and I believe that giving them as many tools as they can reasonably use is an overall positive thing (as long as the humans are still the ones making the final decision, I feel like I should point that out). Though yeah, I agree that that one particular offsides call you’re referring to was egregious and the humans in charge should’ve stepped in and ruled it fair; like I said at the beginning, they’re not perfect yet (and probably never will be, but that’s a whole other matter)
Yeah the VAR at least makes it a bit harder for the FIFA to make Argentina win.