VAR to favour attacking players in radical review of offside law
The offside rule is to be radically reviewed in favour of attackers following the introduction of VAR, and Premier League referees will be told to use pitchside monitors more next season.
As well as concussion substitutes, which are now set to be trialled at the Tokyo Olympics, the annual meeting of the International Football Association Board (Ifab) was dominated by the video assistant referee system and the impact of its implementation across more than 30 countries and 100 competitions around the world.
Fifa president Gianni Infantino singled out the Premier League as “the only one where this issue seems to be a problem” and a series of VARrelated adjustments are now likely.
Arsene Wenger’s proposal to effectively reverse the lines for offside, so there is clear daylight in favour of attacking players, has Infantino’s support, and Ifab has agreed to review over the next year an idea that could result in football’s biggest rule change this century.
Patrick Nelson, Ifab chair and chief executive of the Irish Football Association, said that the review would be based on how to “further encourage and foster the spirit of attacking play”.
Ifab accepts that the ability, now, to make precise offside decisions with VAR has ended the previous principle of giving attackers the benefit of doubt.
With technology to remain, the proposal is to move the line for offside to redress the balance back in favour of attackers.
The Premier League could also widen its line next season for assessing decisions in an attempt to prevent offside “goals” being ruled out by just a few centimetres.
“Assistant referees were always told to give the benefit of the doubt to the attacking team – what VAR has done is take that doubt away,” David Elleray, the Ifab technical director, said. “So, is it appropriate for us to say, ‘We can change the law to restore more benefit to attacking football’? I don’t think we envisaged this would happen.
“Technology, including VAR, has moved it more in favour of the defender than the attacker and football is telling us that was wrong.”
The guidance next season, from Ifab and Fifa, is that the Premier League should use pitchside monitors for subjective decisions.
“Now we have many leagues and competitions [with VAR] we think this is the moment to have less flexibility and maybe make the positive experience of many a sort of guideline for everybody,” Pierluigi Collina, the chair of Fifa’s referee committee, said.
“Certainly in the future there will be less possibility for a single competition organiser or association to do differently from others.
“You should expect there will be some changes next year. The vast majority of competitions believe that the vast majority of subjective decisions should have an on-field review.”
Elleray added: “The English situation is different from a lot of the rest of the world and I would be astonished if it remained as it is next season. I think it’s very difficult for any significant change to be made during the season.”
Asked if England could also introduce thicker lines in its video review of offside to help mitigate the most marginal offside decisions, Collina confirmed that there was nothing to prevent this from happening.