Possibly!
Putting aside the fact that it's Forest, I think any team that has been the subject of so many clearly wrong calls this season (even with VAR assistance) would be entitled to consider 'nuclear option' responses, even it the tweet itself was emotional.
VAR is simply a review tool that gives officials a second chance to get decisions right, and yes there are now far more correct decisions than before VAR, but the fact that they are still making so many laughable mistakes is a reflection on the poor quality of the officials themselves, not on the VAR system. VAR has simply confirmed what many fans already knew - we have a multi-billion game still overseen by amateur (standard) officials and administrators.
Following the investigation I'm waiting for the final delicious irony of the football authorities charging Forest/Neco Williams/Santo or whoever with "bringing the game into disrepute". Pot and kettle doesn't come close. If calling out the utter incompetence and hypocrisy of your governing body is "bringing the game into disrepute" then we need far more disrepute!
If the football authorities want to stop the game being brought into disrepute, the best thing they could do is dig an enormous hole in the ground, jump in it, and then ask fans to shovel several tonnes of earth on top. Come to think it, better line the hole first or the escaping toxic chemicals will pollute the watercourse!
They weren’t accusing the officials of making mistakes, they accused an official of deliberately acting against them because he supports one of their rivals in the table. Then a day later realised they’d gone far too far and started massively backsliding.
It’s been Maranakis MO for years in Greece to accuse officials of bias and corruption, usually getting away with it because he’s a more important figure there than he is here. He’s a huge man baby who cries and screams when he doesn’t get want he wants and the biggest mistake the football authorities have made was ever letting him near one of our clubs because it won’t end well.
Interesting thing about how var has affected each club’s fortunes. Forest aren’t hard done to after all;
https://www.espn.co.uk/football/stor...e-club-2023-24
Hence my caveat 'even if the tweet itself was emotional'.
The problem is, when you see mistakes as blatant and ridiculous as at least two of those three decisions, it beggars belief/credibility that an official at that level could genuinely be that inept - twice! - without some more malevolent explanation.
For the sake of the integrity of the game I have to hope it really was just extreme incompetence and not manipulation, but that conclusion then underpins my subsequent observation that football's officials /administrators are doing more to damage the reputation of the game than anyone bold enough to call them out on such incompetence.
I agree with you, but it only goes to reiterate again what I've said above. When you see multiple decisions as blatantly wrong as the ones in that game, it serves as ammunition for those who would allege corruption, whether they're right or not. I'm not a fan of Forest and certainly not a defender of Marinakis, but the football authorities are giving him (and others like him) so much material to work with that frankly they deserve what they get.
Last edited by jackal2; 24-04-2024 at 10:21 PM.
It’s nowhere near that simple, VAR is a tool that’s sucking the life out of the game. It’s killing it to the extent that if it ever appeared at our level I would seriously consider calling it a day. Refereeing errors have been part and parcel of the game since the first ball was kicked, but they are honest errors. The margins are very fine and you need lines on a computer screen to decide, and even then it’s not always conclusive. It completely ruins the spontaneity that makes the game special.
And I said exactly the same after we were robbed against Coventry.
It's an opinion I hear and understand, but since the first ball was kicked the game has become ever more commercial. Today football's a multi-billion pound industry where one wrong decision could in effect cost a club millions (say like Chesterfield being robbed of an FA Cup Final appearance in 1997), or a mistake dictating promotion/relegation in a final day 'decider'.
Align those 'stakes' with constant evolution of technology and it's inevitable - I believe anyway - that the use of that technology to minimise mistakes will only grow over time. The VAR genie won't be put back in the bottle, in fact more such technology will probably follow on. the only reason we don't see it at our level - yet - is the cost of installing and operating it, but I'm sure it will only be a matter of time.
Last edited by jackal2; 24-04-2024 at 11:00 PM.