Here's the situation - On the final attack of the first half, a ball is crossed in and eventually cleared and the referee blows the whistle for half time. The first replay shows a clear handling offense in the penalty area on that final attack. The players and officials are walking off the field. As the officials walked off the field and into the technical areas, you see first signs that VAR is talking to him. The ref walks back onto the pitch and looks at the video monitor. Most of the players need to be brought out of the locker room and the PK is taken about 7 minutes after the halftime whistle first blew. Video of the event https://streamable.com/8znol
Didnt they learn anything from the UCL debacle? You never make any game changing calls in stoppage time.
IFAB Law 5 : "The referee may not change a decision on realising that it is incorrect or on the advice of another match official if play has restarted or the referee has signalled the end of the first or second half (including extra time) and left the field of play or terminated the match.(emphasis added). Why did that not apply here?
I didn't get this. The PK is being taken after the half whistle has blown. In that situation, there is only the shot. There is no rebound opportunity as time has expired. Thus, only the keeper and the shooter should have been permitted back on the pitch.
No, it's not. In a situation like this, the referee has determined that he has called half time prematurely because has received advice from an assistant (in this case a video assistant) that he is compelled to act upon. So the PK will be taken and then the real half time whistle comes after the PK. Yes. And the referee did a good job indicating this to the players. We've been through this before. There's absolutely nothing in the Laws to support or justify your claim. In fact, denying a player access to field in such a situation would be unlawful. All 22 players have a right--if not an obligation--to be on the field in such a situation. You might be able to argue that all 22 players do not have to be back on the field and the "obligation" language is a stretch. But now you're getting into a tricky area where you technically have to say you've given some players permission to leave the field just because they refuse to come back out of the locker room.
This gets into a question of what is "the field of play"? Law 1 presents that to be the area inside the touch lines and goal lines. He clearly crossed the touch line. I will defer to you on whether there is some other interpretation of that term when it comes to Law 5.
As for the "field of play" part, I'd argue that the spirit of that is to prevent officials from going into a locker room or any place they are out of sight from the players, fans, and coaches and "magically" finding out a mistake was made in the final moments of the game. So yes the center got into the technical area, but that's till the field of play as far as a referee is concerned. Between two video clips, I'm estimating that it was about 30 seconds between the handling and the ref crew first showing signs that the VAR was saying "woah something happened". 30 seconds is actually a pretty good turnaround in this case. It's just those 30 seconds included the half time whistle and most of the players leaving the pitch. For this being a crazy VAR scenario that you can't predict until it happens, I'd say it was handled incredibly well. It'll be spun by those against VAR as a black-eye, but I'd argue (as someone who isn't 100% pro-VAR) that this was a shining moment.
Or Law 18. I mean, look, the video review monitor is outside the touch line. If you take "field of play" to literally mean the big rectangle, then VAR intervention would be logistically impossible at the end of a half or at full time because the referee would not be allowed to leave the field and return. It means the locker room area. If he had gotten into the tunnel before he was signaled by the VAR, he'd have been in some real murky territory and probably would have been in trouble if he brought the teams back out. As it stood, you could tell by the reaction from the Mainz players that they knew something was up before everyone even got to the touch line. And he only steps significantly toward the tunnel in order to whistle and beckon people back. Everything here is fine. It's worth noting that the domestic competitions using VR are telling their VARs to affirmatively let the CR know they having nothing for them before they head to the locker room. From a timing perspective, it would have been better here if the VAR could have told the CR earlier so that players weren't already down the tunnel. But the safety mechanism is in place for situations like this--CRs aren't supposed to be walking off the field until things are complete.
It's also worth noting that while Law 1 does talk about the "field of play" narrowly as the boundaries that contain dynamic play, Law 1 also talks about the techncial area and GLT and virtual advertising. And the entire Law is titled "the field of play." Particularly given we now can call fouls which occur over the goal line or touch line, it's not like there is some hardened case law here. Common sense has to reign supreme.
Here's an example of what I'm talking about. Andy Brassell who has been very anti-VAR in his writing and interviews. He describes it as a "new low" for VAR. I'd argue for the Gene Kranz approach that was one of VARs finest moments. Either way, it's certainly a moment that both sides of the debate can take a spin for their pleasure.
I would imagine they concluded that he had not left the field of play within the meaning of this provision at the time the VAR was initiated.
The more you look at it the more you realize how crazy of a situation if required to get this to happen. You needed a 100% penalty kick to be missed in the final few seconds of a half. Furthermore, it was a penalty kick that barely any attacker asked for despite it being very obviously a handling offense in replay. In most situations like that, you're going to get most of the attacking team surrounding the referee asking for the foul, and in that case the referee and players are not going to be leaving the field until VAR confirms that the decision was correct or needs to be dealt with. How often do you see a top professional League have a 100% handling offense in the penalty area and barely a shout from an attacker?
I'm ok with this approach... but the referee should have put the hand to the ear (as per the protocol) earlier to signal that he was getting VAR information. The real problem here is one of perception: Referee blew for half-time Referee left the field of play (stepped outside of the boundary lines, clearly headed to the dressing room) Referee jumped back onto the field of play and put hand to ear to signal that he was getting VAR information Referee (and VAR) confirm that it was 100% handling and should be a penalty People (not just here) have suggested that the referee only leaves the FOP after the end of a period of play when they're in the tunnel -- but the practical has been that once they step outside of the boundary lines, that period has been completed, and the decision can no longer be changed. If the VAR is giving the referee information after the whistle has gone, there's a good 35-40s to do so. The video above starts from the first replay, and the whistle for HT had gone 5-6s prior to that replay. Then it takes the referee until the 31s mark to cross outside the touchline toward the tunnel. It's about the 40s mark that the officials put hands to ears because VAR information is coming through. That's almost a full minute after the HT whistle has been blown. VAR correct a clear and obvious mistake? Yes Very poor perception (and took WAY too long)? Yes
In instruction, that's what we've been informed by our high level instructors to pass along... ... and I think that this is the first time that we've actually seen something where that distinction may actually play into the situation.