Ashley Young says that it were up to him, football would go back to the days of on-the-pitch human eyes and decisions rather than continue with the Video Assistant Referee experiment that remains controversial despite the promise of a fairer game.
There seems to be a VAR controversy every week in the Premier League and while the incident where Andre Onana somehow got away with clattering through two Wolves players at Old Trafford on Monday evening without being penalised with a penalty was the biggest talking point of the opening weekend of 2023-24, Everton were also denied in a VAR-related incident.
Mystifyingly, referee Stuart Attwell called a foul by James Tarkowski on Bernd Leno in the clash between Everton and Fulham at Goodison Park last Saturday, denying the Toffees a goal when Michael Keane knocked home the loose ball and precluding any involvement by VAR because he blew up before the ball hit the net.
It was the latest in a string of infuriating incidents to have affected matches involving Everton since VAR was introduced and when combined with the ever-changing rules around handball and hair’s-breadth offside decisions, there are many, like Everton’s new signing Young, who feel creeping technology is ruining the game.
“If I’m totally honest, VAR wouldn’t be in football for me,” Young told Vinny O’Connor of Sky Sports, speaking specifically about offside. “If you go back to old school, how it was… That’s just the way it is — if you score and it’s ruled out, it’s ruled out by a linesman.
“If it’s not and it goes against you and a goal is ruled in [the opposition’s] favour, that’s just what happens.
“There are so many fine margins now with VAR, I think it just takes away from playing football. So let’s hope not many more VAR decisions will go against us and they’ll all go in our favour.
“You can talk non-stop about VAR and I think we have done since it was introduced to the game so the less said about it the better!”