Fans were rightly confused when Miguel Almiron was booked during Paraguay’s match against the United States, as the rules were reportedly applied incorrectly.
There was significant confusion during the United States’ win over Paraguay, when referee Danny Makkelie overturned his yellow card to Tim Ream after a VAR review, awarding a booking to Miguel Almiron for simulation instead.
The first point of contention was the fact Makkelie was reviewing the play after the game had already restarted from the free-kick. In general, once play restarts, VAR can no longer intervene.
This was explained by the suggestion that this was a case of ‘mistaken identity’. In cases of mistaken identity, as well as in cases of some red card offences, VAR can intervene even if play has restarted. This is not the case for goals, penalties, and so on.
But the question then is why this was considered a case of mistaken identity. Makkelie didn’t mistakenly believe that Ream had dived (as Almiron had done), he thought Ream had committed a foul.
So he’d misjudged the play, but not because he was confused about the identity of the players. Makkelie didn’t spot a foul but mess up who committed it, he called a foul when a player dived.
The argument presented in the immediate aftermath of the match was that the incident still counted as mistaken identity because the referee had punished the wrong team. But by that logic, almost all incorrectly-awarded free-kicks could be reviewed, even after play restarts.
Simon Stone reports for the BBC that well-placed sources have confirmed that this was an incorrect use of VAR by Makkelie.
The offence itself shouldn’t even have been reviewed by the referee, only the identity of the players involved. And as the identity of the players wasn’t the issue, a review never should have been recommended in the first place.
There hasn’t been significant outrage about the decision, as it was ultimately the right call. Almiron did dive, Ream didn’t deserve a yellow for a foul he didn’t commit, so justice was done.
But VAR shouldn’t have intervened in this case, and it will open up a can of worms if FIFA stand by the decision. Almost all refereeing calls could be reviewed at any time, a situation the football lawmakers (and indeed football fans) have always been keen to avoid.
So far, FIFA haven’t clarified the situation, likely hoping they can just ignore the incident until people stop caring. This World Cup has already drawn plenty of negative PR for the football organisation, they don’t need more headlines about how they’re messing things up.
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