His arm was back and starting to move forward and he tried to pull it back away from the ball when it grazed it... I could have seen it go either way. It really didn't impact the play at all.
FT: VAN 0-1 ATL Atlanta with MLS record 5 shutouts in a row. Vancouver keeper with some fantastic saves.
Sorry Kasey, that wasn't a hand ball. The shoulder is not the hand. Should have been a Seattle goal. Ref blew his whistle too early.
Two bad VAR recommendations tonight IMO. Absolutely ridiculous in Vancouver. Never violent conduct in a million years. Toledo is obligated to show yellow if he goes to the monitor and sees something deserving. That he showed NO card after review tells you how bad that recommendation was. The handling offense in Seattle was doubtful. Came off the opponent's toe at a very short distance. The player appeared to be trying to pull his arm back and out of the way, but really had no opportunity to avoid the ball in that position, and he also wasn't really hanging his arm out wide to make himself bigger and take away the passing space. It would have been a very harsh call on the field and never should have been sent down for review. Hopefully the massive delay was because of technical issues in the VOR and not because the VAR was waffling for like 4 minutes because woof.
Last angle, looked like it came off the back of his arm. From the front, I thought it was closer to the top of the shoulder.
I thought it was the top of the shoulder. Either way, you could make a case that it should have been let go to see if anything came from it, and then have VAR take a look. Thankfully, it didn't matter.
Well, that would be counter to how they're supposed to call the game. The referee doesn't get the privilege of delaying the call like the ARs do on close offside decisions so if he's certain it was handled, the only thing he can do is blow for the foul, right or wrong. If he was not certain, only then is the correct action to allow play to continue because you don't call fouls that are trifling or doubtful. In that case the VAR can step in if it turns out he was clearly wrong. Just another way that VAR inadvertently makes it more likely for goals to be disallowed than awarded after a review. The delayed offside flag is one way to try to balance that out, but it's always going to be tipped that way, I'm afraid.
On the other hand, there are more penalties from handballs due to VAR. But I'm with you, the offside rule in the age of VAR may need refinement. Too many good goals lost to a fraction of a body part being offside, the rule was not created to be that way.
The rule was created to be that way, there was no thought of slow motion replay or VAR to ever exist. I'd like to see the law revised to include that the entire body has to be in front of 2nd defender and not any part of the body.
That's not going to make it any easier to call or less controversial though. Whether some part of the body is one inch in front of the defender or the entire body is one inch in front of the defender, it's the one inch part that makes it hard to call.
It won't end controversy, but it would result in more goals because the attacker can be even with the defender.
But the problem now is they are even, but they're foot or something is ahead, so they are off. Too many goals being called off.