Premier League clubs have voted in favour of changes to next season’s VAR system but do not want to see the popular offside technology from the World Cup introduced.
The tournament in Qatar saw a slight alteration to offside calls, with semi-automated technology in action. A chip in the heart of the matchball combined with Fifa’s Semi-Automated Offside Technology saw a host of cameras generate a 3D image of a situation to determine whether an attacker was offside.
That image was then displayed on big screens in the stadium and on live television broadcasts. The system garnered plenty of praise throughout the World Cup, whilst UEFA also used the technology throughout the recent European season.
Bizarrely the Premier League has voted against its introduction, though. It was expected that the English top-flight would use the technology for the forthcoming campaign, much like LaLiga colleagues in Spain.
However, the option to bring semi-automated offside technology into the Premier League is not on the agenda for the Annual Meeting of all 20 top-flight clubs set to take place in Hampshire next week. It is suggested by The Sun that there are concerns the current version of the technology could soon be out of date.
One man who would be a fan of its introduction, however, would be former Arsenal boss Arsene Wenger. Speaking ahead of the World Cup, the now FIFA chief of global football development said: “Automated means it goes directly from the signal to the linesman and the linesman has on his watch a red light that tells him offside or not offside.
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“At the moment, we have situation where the players are on lines to see if they are offside or not. On average, the time we have to wait is around 70 seconds, sometimes one minute 20 seconds, sometimes a little bit longer when the situation is very difficult to appreciate.
“It is so important because we see many celebrations are cancelled after that for marginal situations and that's why I believe it is a very important step.”
Whilst semi-automated offsides will not be seen in the Premier League for the time being, there will still be some slight tweaks to the VAR system. Four extra offside cameras are set to be used at every game in the Premier League next season in an effort to overcome the problem of a ‘blind spot’ in the current technology.
Bukayo Saka saw a goal stand against Liverpool last season despite seemingly coming back from an offside position. It stood though due to a lack of a correct angle.
Elsewhere, Wolves ’ Mateo Nunes had a goal ruled out in the FA Cup tie against the Reds but once again, enough images of the incident were not available to officials at Stockley Park.
