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Francis Okinyi

Sports interview on the effectiveness of VAR in EPL

This a conversation I had with Martin Moses a sports journalists with Multimedia University of Kenya and this is a transcribe of the whole interview concerning the effectiveness of VAR in English football.

Francis Okinyi:Martin Moses thank you for joining me in this interview on how VAR has impacted the game since its inception in The English Premier League and has had its conflicts of interest so could you talk on one of that.

Martin Moses:Personally I think that VAR is a timely addition in the English premier league and football in General and it is even used in other major leagues in the world have been using VAR but we have seen that there are contentious decisions but from the foregoing I think that the VAR is a good thing because it is striving to make the decisions on the pitch much better.

Francis Okinyi:Right now we know that VAR works on matters penalties ,the issuance of red cards that are inconsiderate and error prone.Technically it does much of the work that maybe the center referee might have been passed by .Others say that VAR makes football boring what is your verdict on that?

Martin Moses :Yeah ,at the moment it make football boring because if you remember when we used not to have it around in our leagues a referee would have made a decision and that would have gone like that.When the VAR looks into something on infringement so the VAR reviews the decision and makes the referee come back on that same issue.There is the issue of lapse of time and those interruptions makes wastage of time and there should be a method on how to make the game fast.That is lagging us behind the game should be fast ta ta ta and VAR is lagging us behind .

Francis Okinyi:so maybe comment on one of the most controversial matches one between Liverpool and Manchester City what is your verdict?Did VAR take a center role should the referee have consulted the VAR in some of his decisions?

Martin Moses:From my perspective from how i have been watching football yes VAR took a center role and was mistaken in one of the decisions the second penalty incident one that Manchester City was crying for that was a valid penalty and if you look at the rules of the game that is a penalty that is what am talking about .One incident there are giving a penalty and the other one they are not so there is no consistency on the use of VAR.

Francis Okinyi:Sawa sawa thank you for your time Martin Moses and do have a lovely time.

Martin Moses:Thank you for having me.

Francis Okinyi

The Video Assistant Referee popularly known as VAR came into use in the English Premier League in the 2019-2020 season.Its use had already been tested in the FA cup and the Carabao cup in each of the two last seasons.It had also been employed in both the German Bundesliga and the Italian Serie A it was also used in the 2018 world cup ,the worlds’ largest sporting event.so what is VAR? the Video Assistant Referee is the use of video technology to make more correct decisions in football matches.VAR only intervenes in the course of a match where the center referee has made an obvious error in one of these key four areas .

First and foremost when it comes to the allowing and disallowing of goals .The VAR is only consulted when a goal has been scored and errors like shirt pulling and any other misdemeanor which is resultant to the goal might make the goal be chalked off.It is worthy to note that clear and obvious errors do not relate to offside,The player is either offside or onside.There is no idea of a little bit offside or a little bit onside and this is allegoric with pregnancy where one cannot be a little bit pregnant but pregnant definitely.A player might be offside even with inches and this would result to the goal being disallowed this happened during Manchester City Vs West ham match.

The awarding of penalties is perhaps the most controversial decision that the VAR is mandated to perform.Penalties can be awarded or rescinded depending on the technicalities of the errors performed.In this case the center referee would run to the VAR monitor by the pitch and make a determination whether the penalty is lawful or not.

violent conduct and reckless tackles can be awarded for straight red cards by the
VAR second yellow cards vests with the referees.

finally ,VAR also handles cases of mistaken identity where a wrong player is penalized and the guilty player allowed to go Scot-free.There is a famous incidence between Kieran Gibbs and Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain in Arsenal’s 6-0 thrashing at Chelsea in 2015 such injustices could be repaired with this technology.The system is limited to only these four areas to avoid constant disruption of the game.

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