David 1 - 1 Golaith (And a poll)

[Stewart]

Ave' it!

Everton, bottom of the Premiership, scored less goals than anyone, let in more goals than anyone, a single win.

Chelsea, top of the Premiership, scored more goals than anyone, let in fewer goals than anyone, 9 wins on the bounce.

They swagger in to our gaff last night, intent on giving it the big one and... 1-1! We get a deserved point, a massive boost of confidence, and are the first team this season to not lose to Chelsea in the Premiership.

Joes is moaning of course, banging on about Drogba being flagged offside when he was on side, conveniently forgetting to mention the fact that Gudjohnson was in an offside position and standing right in the middle of the 6 yard box, and the fact that John Terry blatantly handballed in the box, which was a stone wall penalty, but wasn't given.

Anyway, brag out of the way, and following on from Raves thread on the subject a while ago, did anyone else see MOtD2 last night?

The Middlesbrough - West Ham game. West Hams 2nd 'goal' was clearly nowhere near over the line, and yet the linesman (who isn't supposed to give it unless he is 100% sure it is over) gave it. Even the West Ham players couldn't believe it, and Teddy was apologising.

Another argument for video replays?

Also, while I'm on the subject, lets all laugh at the Pires \ Henry cocked-up penalty from Saturday. Unbelievable.

So - 'ave it Chelsea, Arsenal, and should we have video replays?

Yes for matters of fact (Ball was over the line, ball wasn't over the line)
Yes for anything the ref wants a replay for, including matters of opinion (Was it a foul, etc)
No.
Undecided.

I voted yes, for matters of fact.

I don’t want to see the game stopped every few minutes, but for something as important as a goal being awarded, which costs one team the game, when a 30 second look at a monitor would show that its clearly not a goal must be a good thing.

Anyone remember the Spurs \ Man U game from last season? The lob from miles out that Carrol dropped, with the ball ending up yards inside the goal, that wasn’t given? Things like that, if they can be eliminated in 30 seconds must be removed. It was a joke. Fair enough, the lineman has to be, even by Premiership standards, a complete nob for not seeing it, but it can be sorted out, so why not do it?

[beanbandit]

No video replays. These sort of things will become a thing of the past when FIFA give the full go ahead to sensors in the ball and goal mouth. It will instantly inform the ref whether the ball was over the line. Until then video replays are for cricket and rugby, keep football as it is.

[Lee H]

No video replays. These sort of things will become a thing of the past when FIFA give the full go ahead to sensors in the ball and goal mouth. It will instantly inform the ref whether the ball was over the line. Until then video replays are for cricket and rugby, keep football as it is.

How can you say Video Replay's are for just Rubgy and Cricket.

For example, take Man Utd's folore into Europe last week. An incident occured where a player was elbowed quite viciously in the face resulting in an injury which needed an operation and ANOTHER blow to his face could have rendered him blind, yet the referee was at an angle where he could not see the incident clearly and as such when the player requested Physio assistance to check as he KNEW there was some wrong with his face. Now rather than spend 2 mins like he did with the player asking what happened, are you alright petal? and all that malarkey.

A simple 30 sec video replay of the incident could have shown what happened easier.

I agree the sensor in the ball is a great idea - but for incidents like the one just mentioned above I think video replays should be accessable to the referee as they are only human and mistakes can happen

[sybrows]

I dis-agree (after a lot of thought) with video replays - think of '66 I don't think we would have the Jules Remy Cup with vid replays.....adds more character to the Game without them as makes in not so regimented
BrOw

[BEANFro Elite]

I think referee's should be allowed to look at a replay to decide something difficult, as I'm sick and tired of people bitching about how they had a match stolen by a poor decision from the referee...

Cricket, rugby and tennis all have some system to help the umpire / referee make difficult decisions, and for a sport that slowly losing its popularity they'd be very much ill-advised not to...

[Dav0s]

personaly, being a referee myself I am against video replays, for a number of reasons.

at the moment, nothing seperates premiership football and refereeing from grass roots football and refereeing. i walk out onto the pitch, with 2 assistants, exactly the same as a premiership referee. nothing about the game of football and its rules are different whether you play at the age of 11 for your local side in the park, or whether you step out onto wembley. i like this, and it seperates our game from something silly like egg chasing.

lets pretend we did have video refereeing. the ball looks to be over the line, but nobody is sure, so the referee consults the video replay. it is proven that the ball does NOT cross the line. ok now what. drop ball? no thats silly, anything would be silly, as it haults the flow of the game, and the team could well have been in a position to score again. nothing about that rule would work. when would the referee stop the game for a replay? straigt after the decision? after an advantage is gone? it wont work, i tell thee.

referees make wrong decisions, the game is unfair. who cares, thats football. its been dealt with for over 100 years, and now just because we have technology we should change the rules? no, this will only make a mockery of the game.

if we implement this, soon we will have video referees dealing with penalties, free kicks, off the ball incidents, who knows.

its the referees job (and they enjoy the challenge) of being in the right position, at the right time. relying on themselves and doing their best to control the game. we do it for the responsibility, i hold my hands up when referring to the tottenham/man u goal last season, as the referee could get bak in time, but maybe the linesman shouldnt have been looking at the floor?

anyway, I hope you take in these points from the point of view of a referee, and see that this just wont work.

[kempez]

Agreed. Also a ref and a player since I was 5 Video reffing is stupid

[beanbandit]

How can you say Video Replay's are for just Rubgy and Cricket.

For example, take Man Utd's folore into Europe last week. An incident occured where a player was elbowed quite viciously in the face resulting in an injury which needed an operation and ANOTHER blow to his face could have rendered him blind, yet the referee was at an angle where he could not see the incident clearly and as such when the player requested Physio assistance to check as he KNEW there was some wrong with his face. Now rather than spend 2 mins like he did with the player asking what happened, are you alright petal? and all that malarkey.

A simple 30 sec video replay of the incident could have shown what happened easier.

I agree the sensor in the ball is a great idea - but for incidents like the one just mentioned above I think video replays should be accessable to the referee as they are only human and mistakes can happen

I still say that video replays don't have a place in football while the game is being played. Your simple 30 sec replay will turn into something longer. The ref will need to leave the pitch to find a screen to watch the 30 sec replay. This will turn into 3 minutes as he will want multiple angles of the incident and in slow motion. Then we have to add any action by the ref after he's seen the footage. So the game has now been delayed by 5 minutes. This isn't the sort of football i will pay for.

[Lead_Head]

Firstly, good result for Everton. You won't go down this year but it could a struggle!

Now to the main point... video replays. I wouldn't want them, simply because the game does not need modernising. Referee's add another element to the game. Whether they are right or wrong add's to the banter between your mates.

Making everything exactly correct would spoil the game.

The kind of improvements I would like to see are what Graham Poll trialed not so long ago. He had a state of the art earpiece, and so did the 'referee's assistants / 4th official' (read linesmen) so they could communicate easily and effectively. For instance, the reason for the booking he just gave, he could tell the 4th official who could relay the info to the teams manager. It would stop a lot of abuse to referee's. Also, the linesman can use it to his advantage for offside decisions. He could shout the players name who is offside and the referee can decide whether to play on or not.

Only problem is that it didn't work so promptly ditched the earpiece within the first few minutes. Apaprently it was made by the MoD, fully encrypted frequency so no-one can hear the communication.

[Aaron]

All I know is that Spurs stuffed Everton when they came down to the Lane a week or two back, so that obviously means that Spurs are better than Chelsea.

[Funkstar]

can we add a 'don't give a toss, it's football' option

[tim_n]

can we add a 'don't give a toss, it's football' option

I concur

infact, what's a premiership?

;-)

//avid non-football, and tbh any sport fan.

[iranu]

The only incident where I think technology can be used is the ball crossing the line. How the governing body would administrate this I don't know. As said above when does the referee stop play to consult the 4th official? We already have the nightmare of the new interpretation of the off-side rule, so if FIFA can't sort this out I doubt they can implement simple goal cameras without problems. The only way I can think of it working is the 4th official (or whomever) constanly monitors the goal line and if the ball crosses the line he pushes a button that rings a bell in the refs earpiece.

The biggest problem we have is ya average football pundit who has the benefit of slow mo replays from 50 angles saying, "that was in by a mile/not in by a mile/offside/red card challenge" etc etc and then slagging the refs off from their cosy armchairs.

Anyone who has played competetive football knows you get good and bad refs and that sometimes the good ones have a bad game - that's life. We always expect officials in footie and cricket to get things right 100% of the time, but they can't because they are human beings (although some refs I've met I could make a strong case against!).

I'd like to see referees mike permanently on (like in rugby) which have to broadcast to the public - that could make Andy Gray et al look a bit foolish.

Secondly I'd like to see a process whereby a referees panel plus 4th official etc review the game on video and penalise players who dive, fake injury and try to get players sent off. A 5 game ban would be a good start.

[Russ]

simple rule...

if you think video replays can help football..

you know nothing about football..

the reason it works in other sports is quite simple... no body gives a toss. whocares if henmans ace was actually a fualt? not me, football is too important to the world to have it ruined with video replays. bad and good choices by the ref and the lino's are what make the game so.. well beautiful.

'Some people believe football is a matter of life and death.
I'm very disappointed with that attitude.
I can assure you it is much, much more important than that.