FC Bayern Forum

But people still debate fouls and penalties even if there IS contact. There's no objectivity there at all and we know this happens on a regular basis (why else would they even have the term "50:50"?). Zwayer even got away with sticking to his "opinion" well after the game.

If there is to be such a system where incidents could be reviewed and end up with a match to be replayed, how would you even do it? Maybe a council of referees to review and vote on it? Sure, but how would you first establish the precedent for requiring a review?

It's clear if it's off side or goal line, but fouls? Now I haven't read the laws of the game properly, but as far as I know words like "reasonable", "obvious", "judged" (how do you objectively tell if it's a "clear" goalscoring opportunity? Player in front of a goal? What if the player is shit?) must be littered in the rules.

The rules are **** up, not the system.

Dumbledore7 wrote:But people still debate fouls and penalties even if there IS contact. There's no objectivity there at all and we know this happens on a regular basis (why else would they even have the term "50:50"?). Zwayer even got away with sticking to his "opinion" well after the game.

If there is to be such a system where incidents could be reviewed and end up with a match to be replaced, how would you even do it? Maybe a council of referees to review and vote on it? Sure, but how would you first establish the precedent for requiring a review?

It's clear if it's off side or goal line, but fouls? Now I haven't read the laws of the game properly, but as far as I know words like "reasonable", "obvious", "judged" (how do you objectively tell if it's a "clear" goalscoring opportunity? Player in front of a goal? What if the player is shit?) must be littered in the rules.

The rules are **** up, not the system..

I know what you mean, but in this case if it goes to a popularity vote, the overwhelming judges (referees) would vote that a penalty should have been awarded. Heck, most officials in the match (the VAR team) thought it was a penalty. VAR would/should only intervene when they are *SURE* the referee made a horrible mistake. In a fair world where everybody abides by the rules, the referee would NEVER, EVER, go against the VAR team. If the VAR team are sure, then it means that they've already judged that it's not even open to interpretation.

Any decision by the referee that goes against VAR should be very thoroughly investigated for potential corruption (or plain incompetence), either by the VAR team or by the referee, each and every time. But of course, DFB don't ever investigate stuff unless there's monkey sounds coming from the spectators

Now that the officials have technology helping them, they should be held accountable for any mistakes.

Agreed that the VAR team should have the final say. Again that's a **** up in the rules.

But say if the mistake was done and you'd like to request a replay post-match. How would you even trigger that hypothetical panel of referees to review, how do you manage the incident, what's the precedence for the review?

What I'm saying is, if a qualified referee like Zwayer says it's not a penalty because the rulebook allows him to say so, what ground do Bayern have to stand on?

Dumbledore7 wrote:Agreed that the VAR team should have the final say. Again that's a **** up in the rules.

But say if the mistake was done and you'd like to request a replay post-match. How would you even trigger that hypothetical panel of referees to review, how do you manage the incident, what's the precedence for the review?

The way it used to be done in the 70s, 80s and even the 90s. The club that feels it was wronged by the officials would open a formal complaint to the DFB who would judge whether it deserves further investigation or not. If it does, then a panel of referees would give their opinion.

Dumbledore7 wrote:What I'm saying is, if a qualified referee like Zwayer says it's not a penalty because the rulebook allows him to say so, what ground do Bayern have to stand on?

Let's say you're driving in a one-way street with no other cars and suddenly you find out that a wall has collapsed in the street which has completely closed the street. You decide to make a U-turn and drive back out, but a policeman stops you and hands you a ticket because the rulebook allows him to do so. However, you can then contest the ticket and, at least in my country, you would definitely win it and not have to pay for the ticket.

My point is that just because the rulebook allows him to rule in one way doesn't mean that it was the sensible ruling and can still be contested.

Well here is the FIFA law about fouls:

Direct free kick

A direct free kick is awarded if a player commits any of the following offences against an opponent in a manner considered by the referee to be careless, reckless or using excessive force:

• charges
• jumps at
• kicks or attempts to kick
• pushes
• strikes or attempts to strike (including head-butt)
• tackles or challenges
• trips or attempts to trip

If an offence involves contact it is penalised by a direct free kick or penalty kick.

•Careless is when a player shows a lack of attention or consideration when making a challenge or acts without precaution. No disciplinary sanction is needed
•Reckless is when a player acts with disregard to the danger to, or consequences for, an opponent and must be cautioned
•Using excessive force is when a player exceeds the necessary use of force and/or endangers the safety of an opponent and must be sent off

So in this case it was a careless kick with no disciplinary sanction needed. That's pretty objective. Zwayer did not follow this law. Instead, he decided to create his own law based on whether a contact, which there was (a careless kick), merited for Martinez to fall. This is what baffles me. If instead, Zwayer issued a statement saying that he made a mistake and took the wrong decision, I would have no problem with that for the first time after using VAR. It would become a problem once it is repeated several times after using VAR.

Sounds fine to me, but I still can't believe in it - especially since we're talking about fouls. I've heard of cases where matches do get replayed, but all that I know of are based on something that had to do with goal lines, where it's clearly objective. Happy to be given examples where it were fouls though.

My main problem is the rulebook might as well say that fouls are subjective. In this case, even if Bayern are to complain, when the DFB are consulting Zwayer's team (which they'll no doubt do) to even consider the review, they quite possibly still have a "strong" argument against it, and I highly doubt the DFB would take the case even if they're not corrupt or biased against Bayern.

Dumbledore7 wrote:Happy to be given examples where it were fouls though.

I'll give you an example where it's still discussed whether a player was or was not hit at all, and it wasn't by a player. The greatest theft in history of football. Look up Büchsenwurfspiel or, in Italian, La partita della lattina.