Arsenal could benefit from huge VAR decision but questions remain over referee practices

Wolves have put forward a proposal for the use of Video Assistant Referees (VAR) to be scrapped for the 2024/25 season, with the 20 Premier League clubs including Arsenal set to vote on the matter at an Annual General Meeting in June. Officiating has come under consistent scrutiny for mistakes made throughout the campaign.

In addition, Wolves argue that the experience of watching matches is being negatively impacted for fans. Premature celebrations, confusion over lengthy checks and protests leading to the booing of the Premier League anthem were among the points raised by the club.

According to Dale Johnson of ESPN, the five-season net score of VAR decisions either for or against clubs sees Wolves sit bottom by some way at -17. Arsenal, meanwhile, are second bottom with -7 indicating that they would have benefitted had VAR not been in operation.

Arsenal have had multiple contentious calls made against them including a significant VAR error in their 1-1 draw with Brentford last season which saw official Lee Mason forget to draw the lines for the equaliser which should not have stood. Gabriel Martinelli’s goal at Old Trafford was also deemed by an independent panel to have been wrongly ruled out by VAR.

Then in Tuesday night’s potential title-deciding clash between Tottenham and Manchester City, Kevin De Bruyne was adjudged onside by officials in the lead-up to Erling Haaland’s first goal. Lines were not drawn after the on-field official deemed the decision a clear one but post-inspection has raised questions why this was the case when the call was so tight.

VAR technology was brought in to aid officials in making the right calls. Would scrapping the system in any way improve the decision-making processes?

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The likelihood is that there would be more errors in the game that VAR has been catching. I maintain that the technology is clearly not the issue, and if used effectively and efficiently it would not create the issues which have led the sport to this stage.

The standard of officiating has come into question and was already under scrutiny prior to the implementation of VAR. Those same officials are then in charge of the software itself, meaning it should hardly come as a surprise that the errors and controversy has continued.

Evidence suggests this has not improved the standards enough. In my view, investment should be made in improving the quality of officiating, giving greater opportunity to training a more diverse pool of officials which for many years has been far too closed until more recently and adding stricter accountability for performances.

This will take time, and patience will be required; but that time invested into improving these standards will surely have a greater long-term impact on the on-field decision-making and implementation of VAR. There needs to be further changes too, with VAR operations not conducted by PGMOL officials and instead worked in collaboration with a third party, removing the link which sparked Mike Dean to now famously admit he didn’t send Anthony Taylor to the screen for a hair pull on Marc Cucurella, "because he is a mate", who he explained had already been through a lot in the game.

Lastly, the thresholds for which VAR is deemed to be required for specific situations. It appears that officials are less likely to make calls on the field in the knowledge that the VAR is there to support them, however, the rules dictate that the threshold be so high that it leans on the on-field decision which then leads to decisions which should be checked not to be.

It is quite a mess that needs to be sorted. I am simply not convinced however that the scrapping of the VAR technology is the answer and will lead to more incorrect decisions standing in the future.