FIFA is set to introduce new offside technology at the World Cup this summer, which could lead to the same system being adopted in the Premier League.
Dale Johnson reports for the BBC that FIFA will introduce advanced semi-automated offside technology at the World Cup, with the system giving a real-time audio alert to the assistant referee if a player is more than 10cm offside.
The previous version of the technology tested at the Club World Cup gave alerts in cases of 50cm offsides.
The officials will still hold the final decision of whether to raise their flag and stop play, and the technology still has its limitations in certain scenarios, particularly in the case of subjective calls where the offside player doesn’t touch the ball.
But the intention is to speed things up by allowing the assistant to raise their flag more quickly.
Other technology in use at the World Cup includes 3D scans of the players to produce clearer offside animations, and the use of technology to determine if the ball has gone out of play before a goal is scored.
Johnson reports that a 3D animation will be created in the same style as goalline technology, but for possible balls out of play.
Another addition to the animation options available to the VAR officials is a real-time 3D recreation of incidents to help with line-of-sight judgements on offsides.
The system can replicate the perspective of the goalkeeper to determine whether or not they were impacted by an offside player, and the feed will be available both to the VAR and to TV viewers.
Lastly, the World Cup will use a chip in the match ball to help determine which player touched the ball last before a corner.
Previous reports had confirmed that VAR will be used at the World Cup to check corners, but only if the check can be completed before the ball comes back into play.
This particular addition won’t be implemented in the Premier League next season, as the league doesn’t have a chip in their own match ball, and they’ve opted against checking corners with VAR.
But many of the other upgrades could be considered for English domestic football next season, likely depending on how things go at the World Cup.
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