VAR is now a threat to big boy bias
FOR years managers of teams outside the elite have moaned about how many decisions go the way of the big boys while they get nothing.
Statistics have often backed them up, especially when they are away from home and referees bottle it in front of large, hostile crowds.
Well, if La Liga is anything to go by, their saviour could be coming in the shape of VAR.
When Champions League winners Real Madrid hosted little Levante last weekend the referee gave the home side the benefit of the doubt on two crucial occasions – ruling that a Raphael Varane hand-ball took place outside the penalty area (when it was inside), and giving a Marco Asensio goal when it was offside.
Both decisions were overturned when the men viewing on monitors outside the Bernabeu advised the referee to take another look. Having got the right decisions, Levante went on to win.
So, Sean Dyche, Neil Warnock, Roy Hodgson, Mark Hughes and Sam Allardyce (when you return after Christmas)... there’s hope in the shape of VAR.
Or Validating Also-Rans as it may come to be known.
I WROTE after Arsenal’s two opening defeats how ludicrous the criticism of Unai Emery was and that people like Tony Adams needed to have a word with themselves. Now that Emery (below) has silenced the doubters maybe it’s the turn of the fans who sing “We’ve got our
Arsenal back” to have a word.
I know it’s meant as a feelgood chant, but stating that Emery has given Arsenal back a brand of free-flowing, winning football implies the man who established that brand over two decades, Arsene Wenger, had taken it away. Which, even if true, smacks of unnecessary disrespect to the man who built the modern Arsenal.