When VAR makes a mistake?

The problem is that when watching on television, many viewers saw a Juventus player let the ball touch his hand before, according to current law, the goal would not be recognized for any reason. But VAR did not… detect it, to be exact, the VAR referees did not carefully examine all camera angles to detect the error, or even detect it but did not report it to the referee to handle the situation correctly?

Not only in Serie A but also in the world's top tournaments, the story of mistakes, errors of VAR and VAR referees also happens continuously, still "part of football" as the saying goes to justify the mistakes of referees in the "mortal" era, not like the current technology era. Arsenal once unjustly lost goals, even wins in the Premier League, when the London team continuously led the tournament and raced to the finish line. Barcelona seems to always be "favored" by VAR to have important wins to surpass their arch-rival Real Madrid in La Liga.

There have been countless big and small rules amended and supplemented by FIFA to make football matches fairer and more attractive. Many new technologies have been applied to world football to prevent incidents like the “Hand of God” incident involving Maradona, such as “phantom goals” - the ball crossed or not crossed the goal line, imaginary penalties when the defender has not committed a foul, intentional or unintentional handballs in the penalty area, the first handball or the ball touching another body part and bouncing onto the hand.

Technology brings joy to those who “benefit” of course, but also brings sadness for old habits, old stumbles and even mistakes.VAR refereeWhen the boundary line is not drawn accurately, when the camera angle is not fully monitored as mentioned above, although looking at the whole picture, football or sports today is gradually becoming more objective and fairer when VAR continuously intervenes to clarify every detail, every situation that the naked eye would quickly miss.

VAR technology is equipped at the World Cup. Source: Zing.vn

Vietnamese sports in general and Vietnamese football in particular are also gradually practicing VAR to keep up with the advanced and modern steps of the region and the world. Video Challenge Eyes technology, or VAR, was put into use from the 2022 season and is currently operating continuously in round 1 of the 2023 national volleyball tournament. Accordingly, if the teams request VAR to speak up and it is correct, there is no limit to the number of "complaints". On the contrary, if the request is determined to be incorrect, the number of times will be limited to 2 and then the right to complain will be lost, also to ensure objectivity and not to ruin the match.

During the break of V-League 2023 after 4 rounds, VAR referees of Vietnamese football are also diligently absorbing and operating new technology to apply to the upcoming match. Obviously, besides the remarkable new points about the use of foreign players, overseas Vietnamese players, naturalized players, about the 2-stage competition framework, the early use of VAR will create a new breeze of fairness and objectivity, to minimize the situation of "blowing the whistle" leading to referee discipline, and the buzzing opinions about this and that related to the "judging" team. But that does not mean that VAR referees do not make mistakes for completely different reasons, such as being new to the game, not being proficient, not having much experience, for example.

The VAR system was introduced to European professional football in the Bundesliga and Serie A at the beginning of the 2017–18 season. Source Zing.vn

So, it can be said that technology is important but cannot completely replace humans - humans operating technology, to minimize all errors and mistakes in fierce derby matches, decisive matches where the referee "makes a mistake, and you go a mile astray". When amateurism in sports still lingers, lingers in someone, somewhere, technology is often just a decoration.