FIFA President Gianni Infantino confirms the offside rule could “evolve to do something positive for attacking football,” but VAR is “only a problem” in the Premier League.
The introduction of VAR has meant offsides can be calculated with far greater accuracy than ever before, so goals can be disallowed for mere centimetres, leading to frustration for players, coaches and fans.
FIFA President Gianni Infantino confirms the offside rule could “evolve to do something positive for attacking football,” but VAR is “only a problem” in the Premier League.
The introduction of VAR has meant offsides can be calculated with far greater accuracy than ever before, so goals can be disallowed for mere centimetres, leading to frustration for players, coaches and fans.
“The offside rule has evolved over time and we felt that now was really the right time to look into that, to see whether we can do something positive for attacking football,” said Infantino after the latest IFAB meeting.
“We can now look to see if we can provide strikers with more scoring opportunities.”
Before the technology was adopted, linesmen were told to give attacking players ‘the benefit of the doubt,’ something that is impossible when there is no doubt.
“Ideas about how you judge offside, in one sense, won't change because you will always have the question of, ‘Where do you draw the line?'” added IFAB technical director David Elleray.
“Football is saying to us that we don't think that your toe being two centimetres in front of the end of a defender is a significant enough advantage to be penalised.
“It is not going to change the accuracy, it is saying, philosophically, how do we want offside? Is it appropriate for us to say, can we change the law to restore more benefit to attacking football?”
However, Infantino did take a swipe at the Premier League, where pundits and fans continue to call for the abolition of VAR, compared to leagues like Serie A where the complaint is that it’s not used enough by referees.
“There is only one league in the world where this seems to be a big problem,” Infantino said.
The Premier League is the only tournament where the on-field review monitor is ignored, as the VAR officials are given the responsibility of evaluating even subjective incidents such as red card offences.
In every other competition, the VAR can judge objective issues such as offside or whether a tackle was inside the penalty area, but can only advise the referee to view the incident using the on-field review if there is a potential red card or penalty offence.