Mark Bullingham, the chief executive officer of the Football Association, has raised the prospect of the game’s global rule-making body examining whether audio between referees and VARs should be available live.
Miscommunication between the VAR Darren England and the referee Simon Hooper led to Luis Díaz’s goal for Liverpool at Tottenham being wrongly disallowed last month, leading to further calls for such conversations to be played out in real time. The incident caused huge controversy, with Jürgen Klopp even calling for the match to be replayed.
Broadcasting the conversations between on-field officials and VARs live is currently prohibited under football’s laws, but Bullingham, who is a director at the International Football Association Board (Ifab), which has the power to change the laws, said the organisation had discussed the subject.
“Generally there is a split in the room over that, and quite often it is between the marketing and commercial people and the referees,” he said. “Our point of view, from the marketing and commercial perspective, would normally be that transparency is a really good thing, and we want fans to have the maximum experience.”
Bullingham said an ongoing Fifa trial where referees announce and explain the outcome of an on-field review is a “step in the right direction”, adding: “My personal point of view is I do think [live audio] will continue to be a question over time, because the greater transparency shows how difficult the referee’s job is, and it has worked in other sports.
“There is an understandable nervousness from others that the referee’s job is hard enough as it is. In a tournament you have referees with multiple languages, so it is not as straightforward as some might suggest. So I think we are taking a step in the right direction with announcing the decision and explaining why it has been reached. Let’s see if that leads to further progression.”
Ifab, it is understood, is set to open up the trial of in-stadium announcements by referees beyond Fifa events to other interested competitions. The body may also look again at the wording of Principle 10 in the VAR protocol, which currently prevents VARs from revisiting a decision once play has restarted and meant the officials could not call play back after the Díaz error. It could be updated to allow a decision to be revisited where a clear mistake has occurred, and where no significant action has taken place since play restarted.
Bullingham also said he was aware Ifab had been asked to consider widening the scope of VAR to rule on decisions such as corner kick and free-kick awards. VAR interventions are currently limited to goals, penalties, straight red cards and mistaken identity.
“I think we would be really reluctant to have a game that was stopped a lot more than it currently is, but that will be a proper discussion,” said Bullingham.