Has the time come for VAR itself to be overturned?
The controversial technology faces a make-or-break vote from Premier League clubs next month which will determine its future in the English game.
Here The Athletic looks back at the history of its introduction in England, examines what it was supposed to achieve, why it has fallen so flat, and what would need to happen for it to be dropped.
GO DEEPER
Should Premier League clubs vote to scrap VAR? The case for and against the system
What is the VAR system?
The Video Assistant Referee (VAR) is an official, or team of officials, who help the referee during a game by using video footage and technology to review key incidents and provide advice on the correct decisions.
After watching replays, the VAR gives their opinion to the referee at the stadium via an earpiece worn by the on-field official. The referee will then signal as usual to confirm the original decision or make a rectangle shape with their hands either to indicate an on-field review or that the original decision has been changed.
Usually, the outcome is then shown on screens around the ground to inform supporters.
IFAB (International Football Association Board), the independent body responsible for the laws of the game, states that VARs can only assist a match official in the event of a “clear and obvious error” or “serious missed incident”.
They can step in on decisions over goals, no goals, penalties, direct red cards or cases of mistaken identity.
Where did this concept originate?
The process was first proposed by the Dutch Football Association (KNVB) in 2010, along with goal-line technology. The latter was adopted into the professional game two years later, but VAR took longer to be implemented.
The first live trial was conducted in a friendly match between Dutch clubs PSV and FC Eindhoven in July 2016. Australia’s A-League was the first top-flight league to adopt a VAR system in 2017 and was soon followed by Major League Soccer (MLS) in the United States.
England’s Premier League was one of the last high-profile competitions to use the technology, adopting it for the 2019-20 campaign, after it had also been used in the Champions League from 2017-18, the 2018 World Cup in Russia and 2019’s Women’s World Cup in France.
The feeling at the Premier League was that spending two years monitoring VAR elsewhere would help it be more effective when it was embraced.
How was it first introduced into the Premier League?
After being given updates on various top-flight trials and reviews of its formal use in Carabao and FA Cup matches, a meeting of Premier League shareholders in November 2018 voted unanimously to introduce VAR for the 2019-20 campaign.
The clubs had voted to delay its implementation seven months previously following a debate over its use in some of those cup games, but smoother VAR performance during the 2018 World Cup allayed fears from some supporters and decision-makers.
English football was duly introduced to the VAR hub in Stockley Park, west London, and the concept of each Premier League game having a set of officials based in an office on an industrial estate just outside the capital as well as on the pitch.
On the first weekend of VAR being introduced, the Premier League said around 70 incidents were VAR checked. Manchester City’s 5-0 win at West Ham saw seven checks and two decisions overturned. A Gabriel Jesus goal was ruled out, with provider Raheem Sterling’s shoulder deemed offside, and a Sergio Aguero penalty was retaken (and scored the second time around) after Declan Rice encroached into the area.
The former Premier League referee Dermot Gallagher called it a “great start” and said the overturned decisions “could not have been clear with the naked eye”.
Gallagher added: “It will get better, they will get faster and it will become more commonplace. People will grow into it.”
So why has it proved so controversial?
There was a steady flow of contentious decisions from the outset.
Each of the past four seasons has featured VAR controversies. In February 2021, the VAR invited the referee Mike Dean to consult the pitch-side monitor after West Ham’s Tomas Soucek accidentally made slight contact with the Fulham striker Aleksandar Mitrovic with his elbow. Dean watched the footage on the pitchside monitor and then showed the Czech midfielder a red card — which was subsequently rescinded by a Football Association Independent Regulatory Commission.
Regulation and Discipline update: pic.twitter.com/Hhg1sWNkYs
— FA Spokesperson (@FAspokesperson) February 8, 2021
A year later, in a game against Manchester City, Everton’s appeals for a penalty for a Rodri handball were dismissed. Despite TV replays showing that the City midfielder misjudged the bounce of the ball and used his upper arm to control it, VAR official Chris Kavanagh did not question Paul Tierney’s decision not to award a penalty.
Then Everton manager Frank Lampard called VAR official Kavanagh a “professional who cannot do his job right”, and the head of referees at the time, Mike Riley, later apologised to the Merseyside club.
Just looking at this season alone, VAR has been at the centre of multiple high-profile flashpoints.
Liverpool’s Luis Diaz saw a goal wrongly disallowed for offside against Tottenham Hotspur in September, while Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta was angered by the decision to allow Anthony Gordon’s winning goal to stand — when it was unclear whether the ball went out of play before the goal — for Newcastle United against his team in November.
Both the Merseyside and London clubs went on to make public statements criticising the decisions. Nottingham Forest have written letters of complaint to the PGMOL (Professional Game Match Officials Limited) and even considered suing.
Supporters have grown fed up, too. The long delays and lack of communication with fans in the stadium have chipped away at the spontaneity and joy of watching a game. Players, too, have admitted the emotion of celebrating a goal has been diminished in case it gets disallowed by VAR.
GO DEEPER
The VAR incidents that upset Premier League clubs and the big calls it got right
How has the vote to scrap it come about?
It was Wolverhampton Wanderers, one of the Premier League teams most heavily impacted by bad calls, who acted first and publicly called for VAR to be scrapped this summer. That triggered a vote which will take place when representatives of the 20 clubs assemble for their annual gathering in Harrogate, North Yorkshire, on June 6.
A Wolves statement said that “after five seasons of VAR in the Premier League, it is time for a constructive and critical debate on its future. Our position is that the price we are paying for a small increase in accuracy is at odds with the spirit of our game, and as a result we should remove it from the 2024-25 season onwards”.
They also listed a host of the repercussions, including:
- Frustration and confusion inside stadiums due to lengthy VAR checks and poor communication
- A more hostile atmosphere with protests, booing of the Premier League anthem and chants against VAR
- Overreach of VAR’s original purpose to correct clear and obvious mistakes as it now overanalyses subjective decisions and compromises the game’s fluidity and integrity
- Diminished accountability of on-field officials due to the safety net provided by VAR, leading to an erosion of authority on the pitch
- Continued errors despite VAR, with fans unable to accept human error after multiple views and replays, damaging confidence in officiating standards
The Athletic’s own subscriber poll saw fans of 15 clubs vote in favour of the system being scrapped.
How many clubs want to get rid of it?
That is difficult to know with any certainty, at least until the vote next month, but there is a sense that opinion is split.
Some, with Wolves obviously among them, have had enough while others feel there is a risk that ending VAR would undermine the Premier League’s reputation.
At the same time, there is a sentiment at some clubs that one of the main issues remains one of perception: that the initial idea of a perfect system that eradicated any inaccurate decisions was never realistic.
What has to happen for it to be abolished?
For a motion to be passed, 14 Premier League clubs need to vote in favour of it.
So is there a chance that will happen?
Behind the scenes, there is scepticism among top-flight executives over whether that number will be reached, with a majority seeking improvements rather than simply washing their hands of VAR.
For their part, the top-flight’s board of directors believes removing VAR is not the correct path forward, suggesting that doing so would increase wrong calls and adversely impact the Premier League’s reputation among Europe’s leading divisions.
It also thinks the void left, having removed VAR, would potentially place even greater criticism on on-field decisions made by match officials and, as a result, increase frustration for supporters.
The league points to innovations such as semi-automated offside technology (SAOT) — which was voted through unanimously in April — and in-stadium VAR announcements as evidence of the efforts being made to improve the system.
GO DEEPER
What is semi-automated offside technology and how does it work?
What do referees think of VAR?
The PGMOL remain an advocate of VAR and believes it is a tool that has helped reduce errors.
In December, referees chief Howard Webb said it would “be foolish to take away a tool that can remove clear errors from the game”. They are committed to making it better but will not bow to pressure to speed up decisions at the expense of accuracy. They believe delays are an inevitable part of the process, although they are keen to make improvements to its efficiency.
As well as automated offsides due to be adopted in the next 12 months, the PGMOL want to improve communication of in-stadium decisions when IFAB laws allow for it.
The PGMOL are working at establishing more dedicated VAR officials (rather than using referees who regularly officiate matches) and there is already an unofficial group who are regularly selected as VARs because of their consistency. Of those, Stuart Attwell and David Coote have been selected as VARs for this summer’s European Championships.
They believe the inevitable capacity for human error means VAR will never be perfect, but an independent panel’s assessment that 96 per cent of decisions over the last five years have been correct suggests that, overall, it works.
Webb, who regularly attends shareholders meetings to hear views of clubs, is expected to be at June’s meeting.
Does the Football Association have a view?
The FA is believed to remain behind VAR.
What would getting rid of VAR mean for other refereeing technology in the Premier League?
Goal-line technology would likely remain but, when it comes to VAR, the understanding is that the top flight could not cherry-pick some elements and dispense with others. It either continues with all of it or without any of Stockley Park’s reviews.
Have any other countries scrapped the VAR system?
Last month, Sweden became the first country to reject implementing VAR after a fan backlash.
Supporters from clubs — where there must be a minimum of 51 per cent fan ownership — prompted the climbdown after the president of the Swedish Football Federation, Fredrik Reinfeldt, had previously backed the idea. Reinfeldt had approved trials later this year, but those will not now go ahead.
“Sweden is currently the only country among Europe’s 30 highest-ranked leagues that has not decided to introduce VAR,” said Johan Lindvall, general secretary of the Swedish Professional Football Leagues. “The fact that we have not done so is largely due to our democratic model.”
Is video technology equally controversial in other sports?
The replay review process in NFL games involves the ultimate team-oriented system. NFL officials conduct reviews — which, in 2022, lasted on average two minutes and 19 seconds — but not without the support of replay officials stationed in New York at the NFL’s Art McNally GameDay Central (AMGC).
Head coaches can use two game challenges during games (if successful on both challenges, they receive a third). But, in the final two minutes of each half, all challenges or play reviews are initiated only by the replay official.
The process itself has become pretty smooth. Once a challenge or play review is initiated, replay technicians at AMGC use technology to pinpoint the best camera angles for the game referee to review in consultation with replay officials.
An ‘instant replay field operator’ then brings a Microsoft Surface tablet to the referee so he can review the play while consulting with the replay official stationed in New York. The final decision on the review (whether it should be overturned, or whether the on-field call should be upheld) is then made and the referee announces it.
Like football, rugby union features split-second decisions and high levels of physical force, and no two challenges look the same.
For a video referee, the potential for inconsistency is high. Yet they have always been more accepted in rugby — even when introducing controversial new high-tackle laws or when making high-pressure calls in the sport’s biggest games.
Cricket’s version of VARs — the Decision Review System (DRS) — largely operates on a review basis. If a team disagrees with a decision, they can refer it to an off-field umpire to watch the incident back and use various forms of technology to determine whether the on-field umpire’s decision was correct.
If the team’s review is correct, they keep their review to possibly use later in the game; if wrong, they lose it.
GO DEEPER
Challenges, communication and ‘umpire’s call’: What other sports can teach football about VAR
What about the women’s game in England?
VAR was first rolled out at the Women’s World Cup in 2019. It was subsequently used at the European Championship in 2022 and a 19-strong video refereeing team — which included six women — were sent to Australia and New Zealand in the summer to cover the 2023 World Cup.
But even as VAR was being castigated in the opening months of this Premier League season, a different debate was taking place in the Women’s Super League (WSL).
In October, during Chelsea’s home match against Tottenham, officials failed to spot the ball had crossed the line when Guro Reiten looked to have put Chelsea 2-0 up. With no goal-line technology or VAR in the WSL, the goal was not given.
Chelsea manager Emma Hayes was incandescent, saying it is “ludicrous” and “embarrassing” that there is no VAR in women’s football.
The previous month, Chelsea had run a VAR test at Kingsmeadow for their friendly against Roma — it was the first of its kind at a WSL ground. Baroness Sue Campbell, the director of women’s football for the FA, subsequently admitted that VAR “has to come in”.
It may not be long before VAR arrives in the English women’s game. NewCo, poised to take charge over the running of the WSL from the FA next season, intend to prioritise the improvement of officiating.
“The better the refereeing, the better the product itself — it’s one of the priorities, for sure,” Nikki Doucet, the CEO of NewCo told reporters in January. “From a VAR perspective, it’s something we need to figure out. Is that the right thing for our game, based on what’s been done in the men’s game? Is there a new alternative?
“A lot of the stadiums themselves just aren’t ready for that (technology) and so it will require an amount of investment. As we go on this journey, it’s prioritising what has to be done first based on the resources and the investment that we have. It’s definitely something that’s a priority.”
(Top photo: Bradley Collyer/PA Images via Getty Images)