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Valloni / News  / NEW BOOK ON VAR
15 November 2024

NEW BOOK ON VAR

Technology is an integral part of our daily lives, and, to some degree or another, we have become dependent upon it, and sport is not beyond its outreach.

In fact, many sports are now embracing technology, in one form or another, to replace or supplement human-decision making in their competitions and events, including the world’s most favourite sport, football.

In 2019, the English Premier League introduced the Video Assistant Referee (VAR) system, which is used to review and correct the on-field decisions of referees.

In the same year, the Swiss Super League, on the initiative of the SAFP, the Swiss Football Players’ Union, introduced VAR, after its 20 member clubs voted unanimously to adopt it. The nerve centre of VAR is located at the Swiss Football League Technical Operations Centre in Hegnau, in the Canton of Zurich.

However, VAR is not without its critics, who claim that it is too slow and keeps fans in the stadiums in the dark.

Also, according to Dr Tom Webb of Coventry University in the UK:

“The issue with VAR is it’s not necessarily relying on how accurate the technology is. It’s still reliant on individual judgement and subjectivity, and how you interpret the laws of the game.”

A new Book devoted entirely to the subject of VAR has been published on 7 November 2024. It is intriguingly entitled ‘I Can’t Stop Thinking About VAR’ and the author is Daisy Christodooulou, a football fan. It is published by Swift Press.

According to her, VAR has been a disaster:

“Players hate it, managers hate it, pundits line up to pour on its decisions, and fans have coined the chant ‘it’s not football anymore’ to describe its effect on the game.”

The author points out that every other sport in the world has managed to integrate technology into its decision-making process and poses the following questions:

Why is football failing so badly?

Is it a special case, or have the game’s authorities got something wrong?

And what does the controversy about VAR tell us about the nature of authority, rationality and technology in the 21st century?

These are very pertinent questions indeed and need to be answered by the proponents of VAR wherever the system is in operation!

For further information, email ‘info@valloni.ch’.