FIFA World Cup 2018 - GROUP G [Belgium, Panama, Tunisia, England - 18/23/24/28 June] **spoilers**

[melmac]

It's a clear penalty, ignore the idiots with English bias doing the 'analysis' on BBC.

Exactly. I have to wonder what exactly they are seeing? If an English player got taken down like this, they would be praising the ref for making that call.

This is lol-worthy. Such disconnect from reality.

Not really, the only people with a disconnect are those that think it wasn't a penalty. I guess you are one of those.

I've watched it many times. The Tunisian is absolutely looking for it, and fools the ref. You can see from the Tunisian's reaction how pleased he is with his little stunt, slapping his thighs in delight after throwing himself at the floor.

You should watch it again. From a few different angles. Walker swings his arm back behind him. The Tunisian player is looking at the ball. When he feels the contact on his head he falls to the ground. And the Referee awarded the penalty. I don't know what Walker was trying to do. What he did wasn't a natural motion, It wasn't caused by momentum or him trying to protect himself. He threw his arm back behind him and hit the Tunisian player at head height. Penalty.

Players can celebrate getting a penalty. I cant even believe its a debate...he's fouled him lol. It doesnt matter if hes looking for it...loads of players do. What matters is Walkers has shoved his arm out and blocked his run. Its so clear cut.

Yeah, imagine celebrating getting a penalty!! It was a stupid thing for Walker to do, left the Ref with no option but to award the penalty. There was no other players around, nobody blocking the refs view. Yeah, it's so clear cut.

lol.

You are right, I hadn't seen the Japan/Colombian game when I made that statement. The penalty Japan got was the most clear cut penalty of the tournament so far.

TBF your posting style is very much subjective. You don't let the facts get in the way of your own opinion.

All I can do to this post is laugh. Is this the best you can do?

I agree with you about one thing, not all penalty decisions are 100% correct. Before the introduction of the VAR, it was an impossible task. Especially in today's game where players flop and dive, anything to try and fool the ref into giving free kicks and penalties.

But, in this case it was a very simple call for the ref to make. Player from Team A swings his arm back and connects with Player from team B's head in the penalty area in clear view of the Ref and making no attempt to play the ball. Not really sure how anyone can think that's not a penalty.

The only really controversial incident was when Harry Kane was taken down in the penalty area. I would love to see why it wasn't awarded as a penalty. Was it because Stones fouled his defender just before that? It would do a lot for the future of the VAR if somebody could explain some of more contentious calls after the game. It would help with transparency.

 

[Egon]

I accept your subjective opinion.

 

[mmj_uk]

I think the fact that so many incidents are still being argued about makes VAR a failure, the whole point of it was to correct bad decisions instead it's being used to scrutinise some incidents to the minutest detail or just ignored completely in the case of Kane and people are still left wondering about bias still being present in refereeing.

I think they need to just give each team 3 challenges per match and that's that, if they waste their challenges or fail to challenge an incident then it's their own fault. If they make a successful challenge they get the challenge refunded in case of it being a completely shocking referee.

Let the teams decide what decisions they want looked at, not the sometimes bent officials.

 

[MooMoo444]

VAR hasn't been a failure. It's already caught and changed several decisions, and that's only the first round of games. We have a whole tournament to go.

The England game was an anomaly. I don't know what went wrong there but FIFA have already said they will investigate.

 

[mmj_uk]

They need to remove the ability of the officials to decide what should be reviewed or not, it's too open to bias and match fixing. Let the teams decide what decisions they would like reviewed through a challenge system.

Of course it has corrected quite a few mistakes but officials have also ignored quite a few other incidents that people were screaming about. If England had lost 2-1 we'd still all be thinking that we'd been done over by bad officiating and what if it was a final?

 

[Shamikebab]

Even if VAR only catches 50% of the bad mistakes that still makes it a success, because before it we caught 0% of the mistakes.

 

[Lopéz]

VAR a failure? You're having a laugh, it's just advanced the game twenty years overnight.
Nothing is ever going to be perfect.

 

[Mr Jack]

I accept your subjective opinion.

I'm bored of discussing our subjective opinions on a penalty that made no great difference in the end.

 

[Mr Jack]

Even if VAR only catches 50% of the bad mistakes that still makes it a success, because before it we caught 0% of the mistakes.

Quite. VAR is new, and its use could be improved, but branding it a failure is absurd.

 

[spook2575]

Quite. VAR is new, and its use could be improved, but branding it a failure is absurd.

Agree not a failure. At least the tech works (not that it should be complex) just the case of refining the process which in part can only be done after rolling it out.

 

[FoxEye]

Even if VAR only catches 50% of the bad mistakes that still makes it a success, because before it we caught 0% of the mistakes.

Yeah agree with this. Even some of the (less intelligent) pundits were suggesting VAR is a failure if mistakes still happen. That's utterly missing the point. Every single decision that would have been wrong but for VAR is a success for the system.

Eliminating 5 out of 20 mistakes is a success. Hell, eliminating 1 out of 20 mistakes is a success.

And so far it's not been particularly intrusive or confusing for the audience. So all round a good showing for VAR.

As before, we need consistent reffing. VAR doesn't compensate for wildly inconsistent refereeing between games and even in a single game.

 

[Jokester]

VAR has been largely been spot on, other than cases where opinion can differ eg is it a push or is it just a hand on his back?

 

[fez]

Its not as simple as "VAR corrected 2 decisions and missed 2 so its clearly a success". What if those two decisions go for one team and the other team get none. The fact is that refs and linesman are human and they make mistakes, you can accept that. When you have a system to stop these mistakes and that system is not fair and even for both teams then I don't think it should be used.

 

[Mr Jack]

Its not as simple as "VAR corrected 2 decisions and missed 2 so its clearly a success". What if those two decisions go for one team and the other team get none. The fact is that refs and linesman are human and they make mistakes. When you have a system to stop these mistakes and that system is not fair and even for both teams then I don't think it should be used.

What if the ref makes mistakes that favour one team? Silly to think that this is okay but not with VAR.

 

[FoxEye]

Its not as simple as "VAR corrected 2 decisions and missed 2 so its clearly a success". What if those two decisions go for one team and the other team get none. The fact is that refs and linesman are human and they make mistakes, you can accept that. When you have a system to stop these mistakes and that system is not fair and even for both teams then I don't think it should be used.

How is the system itself not fair for both teams? Aren't you just saying that human error and bias is still a factor?

 

[4K8KW10]

How is the system itself not fair for both teams? Aren't you just saying that human error and bias is still a factor?

Yes, there is human error, always - the penalty against South Korea - that dude was just looking for contact - penalty shouldn't have been awarded.
The goal yesterday for Iran - they should have accepted it, too.

The first goal Kosta against Portugal - clear foul - he should have taken a yellow card for that.

 

[The Running Man]

Var just gives humans a second chance to review the incident

It's still a human decision

 

[4K8KW10]

I just hope the referees won't help the Spaniards in a possible next clash against Russia.

 

[Kelt]

Var just gives humans a second chance to review the incident

It's still a human decision

Yep.

We need to give the decision making to advanced, unhackable AI.

It'll come one day, just a question of when.

 

[fez]

What if the ref makes mistakes that favour one team? Silly to think that this is okay but not with VAR.

How is the system itself not fair for both teams? Aren't you just saying that human error and bias is still a factor?

Because previously a refs mistake was somewhat unavoidable. If he didn't see it thats that. Now they can simply refer any decision they are not sure about to the VAR team. There are very few incidents where the ref completely misses the incident. He may not have a perfect view but he will usually see what has happened.

I know what you are saying, its still up to a human to refer it but now I don't think there is an excuse for getting a game changing decision wrong yet they are still having massive issues. The England game could easily have been a very different result and affected our chances of going through to the next stage.