Fifa delays video replay experiments despite support from assorted FAs

http://www.theguardian.com/football/2015/feb/28/fifa-delays-video-replay-experiments-ifab

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Perhaps they should have been watching events unfold at Old Trafford on Sunday when Sunderland’s Wes Brown was sent off after appearing not to touch Radamel Falcao but being in close attendance when John O’Shea fouled the Colombian. But football’s lawmakers have ruled out live experiments with video replays in the game within the next 12 months, despite support for the idea from the English and Scottish FAs.

Fifa’s secretary general, Jérôme Valcke, said the decision over whether to introduce video replays was the biggest ever in the history of the International Football Association Board that governs the laws of the game.

At a meeting in Belfast, it was decided that live experiments should be delayed while the matter is considered further by two Ifab subsidiary panels of football and technical experts.

The Dutch FA has been conducting an experiment where referees were able to pinpoint which decisions they may have made differently had they had access to advice from another official viewing replays in an outside broadcast lorry. But live trials during a match could not go ahead without Ifab approval and there was a split within the board – made up of the four home nations and four Fifa representatives – over how to proceed.

Greg Dyke, the FA chairman, said he was disappointed by the delay and that the game needed to take action to avoid another Frank Lampard moment – it was his disallowed goal in the 2010 World Cup that led to goalline technology being introduced.

“I’m a great fan of video technology,” Dyke said. “I was a bit disappointed that we hadn’t got it further than we have done. If there are means of helping referees, we should think about them, try them in trials and, if they work, adopt them. Instead of waiting until you get a ‘Frank Lampard’ to change the rules, as with goalline technology, we should go on the front foot. It’s going a bit slower than some of us would have liked.”

The issue has risen to the top of the lawmakers’ agenda again in recent months in light of improvements to technology and a string of contentious incidents. Sepp Blatter, after years of opposition to the idea, made a characteristic U-turn in São Paulo before the World Cup. “Why don’t we give team managers the possibility of two challenges for refereeing during a match? If a manager disagrees with a decision, he could ask for an immediate TV review with a referee,” the Fifa president said.

But Valcke urged caution and said the board had discussed the extent to which video replays might affect the flow of the game and the authority of the referee. “Is there a risk the referee will not be as strong as he is today? What is his relationship with his assistants as compared to this official in a van? It is the biggest decision that would come out of Ifab ever,” he said.

The board did agree to recommend a change to the triple punishment rule when players are sent off, suspended and concede a penalty for the denial of a goalscoring opportunity in the penalty area. Patrick Nelson, the Irish FA chief executive, said it had asked Fifa to look into dropping the automatic one-match ban. A proposal to allow a fourth substitute in extra time was knocked back but a move to change the rules to permit rolling substitutions in recreational football was allowed.