It’s time to use video technology
Roar Guru By mactheblack, 22 Jun 2010 The Crowd is a Roar Guru
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- 2010 World Cup, Brazil, FIFA, football, Ivory Coast, Kaka, referees, Sepp Blatter, video ref, World Cup
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It’s time to bring out the video referee, for football that is. The World Cup in South Africa has finally justified the use of it.
Thank goodness there have been no controversial goal-line decisions as yet that could’ve decided crucial matches. But don’t rule it out, that will happen. There’s still some way to go yet in the tournament. I wager a bet that the plethora of gut-wrenching tackles, feigning of injury, provocation, not to mention diving, will justify such a move.
FIFA head honcho, Sepp Blatter, has his reasons, for not introducing technology, but I reckon he’s going to have to change his mind soon. Take the sending off of Kaka in Brazil’s 3-1 win over Ivory Coast on Sunday. If this wasn’t a case of provocation by the Ivorian player, (actually wanting to get Kaka sent off) then I don’t know what is!
Kaka received a second yellow card for a bookable offence and had to retreat to the change rooms for the rest of the match. His comment was: “I’m not commenting, it’s there for all to see.”
What he of course implied is that he was clearly provoked. His back was turned and seeing the on-rushing Ivorian out of the corner of his eye, he was forced to ward him off quite harmlessly – with a brush of the arm. Then the histrionics followed that got Kaka sent off. Here’s enough cause to use the video technology to possibly exonerate Kaka and rescind the red card and impose it on the Ivorian instead.
The number of players who are willing on referees to flash out the yellow or the red card when a foul is committed, is ridiculous to say the least. Where has the referees’ authority gone? Any player who tries to coerce the referee into giving another player a red card or a yellow card, by gesticulating wildly, should be dealt with harshly.
The referees have become clearly impotent – they’re copping too much flak from players on the field. Can’t blame these blokes at all. Whatever the sport, armchair critics should understand that the refs don’t have the technology couch-potatoes, commentators and the rest, have at their disposal, with every decision. They have to blow it as they see it – in a split second.
Now we have HD technology, extra slow-mos, etc, that exposes the refs even more. So please help these poor blokes, give them more powerful ref committees and rid soccer of the bad elements.
With so much money involved and so much at stake, there is now a need for technology’s beady eye to make its (long-awaited) entrance. It’s time FIFA realised that the referees are fast losing their authority, and should do their best to give it BACK to them. Otherwise the beautiful game faces ruin at the hands of some of these on-field thugs – the players!
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The Crowd Says (6) | Page 1 of Comments
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- Explore:
- 2010 World Cup, Brazil, FIFA, football, Ivory Coast, Kaka, referees, Sepp Blatter, video ref, World Cup
June 22nd 2010 @ 3:22am
dasilva said | June 22nd 2010 @ 3:22am | Report comment
I absolutely agree
However, what we will see is Sepp Blatter will feign outrage and then just say some statement about fair play and expect players to voluntarily play within the rules of the game and how we will look into it in the next FIFA conference (which will then be ignored when the controversy dies down)
Then say some rubbish about how human error is part of the spectacle of the game and feed misinformation about video referee impacts the flow of the game
June 22nd 2010 @ 10:07am
Marcel Proust said | June 22nd 2010 @ 10:07am | Report comment
Totally disagree.
Football works perfectly well as it is. The pro-video zealots normally argue that we only need to use it for goal decisions,
What happened to Kaka was nothing to do with a goal.
It seems obvious to me that those who want to watch stop-start rubbish should go and watch American Football.
Proper football is doing just fine, thanks. It seems to be quite popular.
If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.
June 22nd 2010 @ 2:28pm
dasilva said | June 22nd 2010 @ 2:28pm | Report comment
Yeah it’s popular but doesn’t mean their aspects of the game being flawed.
In any cases, I’ll argue for the usage of video replays for goals, penalties and sends off.
June 22nd 2010 @ 12:53pm
JB said | June 22nd 2010 @ 12:53pm | Report comment
I can’t agree totally with MP but am sympathetic of his view.
I definitely believe technology must be used to rescind clearly innocent people booked or sent off and suspend the divers. No one expects the ref or linesman to be perfect – but we have the technology to cover if they are mistaken (or even worse, conned).
Blatter has bleated that video usage will slow down the game. HELLO. How about the five minutes it takes every time some prima donna rolls around for a free kick / yellow card, gets on a stretcher then has a miraculous recovery? Let’s do a deal – don’t stop play when someone goes down (unless it is clearly real (ie bleedingly obvious, literally and metaphorically) – it might discourage players taking a breather to kill time – if they did that maybe I could live without video replays…
It’s 2010 not 1950 – use what’s available… they use current technology for boots, shirts and balls, why stop there?
John
June 22nd 2010 @ 2:14pm
Greg said | June 22nd 2010 @ 2:14pm | Report comment
I don’t want video replays mid game. My view is an incident is usually capable of opposing views & decisions when viewed on video.
Take Australia’s two red cards. I have watched both many times on replay, my view is Cahill ‘s was a red (tackle from behind), and Kewell’s was “play on” (not deliberate hand/arm ball, no foul).
Others have a different view of these incidents.
Let’s not substitute the ref’s view for some faceless “video ref” in the stands, llike NRL has done.
June 23rd 2010 @ 1:52pm
zzzz said | June 23rd 2010 @ 1:52pm | Report comment
In many sports the ref has a lot of power but if you look at the final scores of soccer matches, its clear that a single decision by a soccer ref can determine the whole outcome. That suggests to me that its important their decisions are reliable or at least credible. When you have a showpiece World Cup every 4 years it would make sense to take all practical steps to get decisions right. Given the instant availability of video footage of incidents, its a no-brainer to use it.
The current situation is clearly unsatisfactory. We have players wrongly sent off, players wrongly suspended, goals wrongly diallowed, players wrongly shown yellow cards, handballs ignored, the list goes on. Every 4 years its the same. Why should this elite global sporting event remain such a joke. A video ref doesn’t need to be less qualified than the on-field ref, nor are they a substitute -just an acknowledgement that the ref and touch judges (if this WC is any indication) can’t be expected to see every incident clearly. As noted above it wouldn’t disrupt play any more than the ludicrous antics of cheats already does.
Why should refs be forced to make snap judgements when such technology is here? If evidence based decisions were allowed at this level, there would be alot less illegal acts and alot less allegations of corruption and incompetence levelled at the officials. Matches would be decided more on merit than other considerations. So what is FIFA’s problem???