DRS and VAR and TMO, oh my!
Watching the Football World Cup put some thoughts into my head about how technology is used to officiate sports matches so I thought I would indulge in some sports-posting.
Rugby, Football and the TMO/VAR
I don't follow rugby very extensively but I still think it's mentioning as a sports that is similar to football in many ways. It's free-flowing and can be quite a quick game, although similar to football when the ball goes out of play or there are fouls it can really grind to a halt. This is especially true for the TMO which stands for Television Match Official which is for a referee watching the television screens and angles to look for infringements, especially when leading up to important moments such as tries. This is very similar to how it works in football for VAR (Video Assistant Referee) where it checks moments leading up to goals for infringements such as offside. However in football it's even more impactful, since a try is worth 5 points + 2 if you score the conversion and average scores in rugby are around 20-30 but in football there's only a few goals each game. Therefore a goal being disallowed on review or a penalty being given can completely change the course of a match. Thus it's important that the decisions are fair and correct, which brings up how decisions are made.
In these games there's rules but they're often not defined in ways that are objective, leaving some of the enforcement up to the discretion of the referees. This is a good thing since it would be impossible to set out specifically what behaviour is allowed or not. Also if there was an objective line people would try to skirt as close to it without crossing it which is frustrating since you want the game to be played fairly. Instead it has to be a judgement call based on how the referee thinks the game should be played. This is a big problem with the video referee where they can refer events to the main referee for fouls where people can dispute what the correct decision should be.
Contrasting with Cricket
However, cricket is a different kind of sport since it's a bat and ball sport with breaks between each time the ball is bowled. This makes it feel different with the DRS (Decision Review System) since it doesn't break up the flow of the game. Additionally cricket as a sport has laws instead of rules, with umpires instead of referees. This might just sound like quibbling over terminology but it means that their decision carries more weight and is decided more objectively based on the laws. Also there's very careful decisions around what kinds of things the third umpire (terminology for the television umpire) reviews. They review things like runouts or stumpings which are just a case of checking whether bats cross a line before a ball hits the stumps first, these are typically simple and uncontroversial decisions in slow motion.
More complicated decision making in cricket utilises some sophisticated technology. In cricket you're out if you hit the ball and it's caught by a fielder before hitting the ground. However it's often difficult to determine if the ball has actually hit the bat when it's a very faint hit. There may not be much deflection but there's typically some kind of sound. Thus there's technology used where a camera is synced up with audio technology to work out if there's a sound at the same time as the ball is next to the bat on the camera. There's also LBWs in cricket which stands for 'Leg Before Wicket' and means the ball hits the batter's leg and was going on to hit the stumps. However the umpire has to predict whether it was going to hit the stumps which can often be a difficult thing to judge and this rule has been a frequent source of controversy. In cricket they use a technology called Hawk-Eye to project where the ball was going to go if it was unimpeded to decide if an LBW decision was correct. This is really cool technology and is used in other sports but it does require many cameras from different angles to be able to correctly model the trajectory of the ball. In football and rugby there is some sophisticated technology used; just in this world cup there was some buzz about using similar audio technology as cricket to work out if there was a deflection of the ball, however most of the time it's just looking at different camera angles to work out what happened which isn't very objective and tends to just reinforce the first impression the umpire gets.
Also in cricket for many decisions it takes a while to load the technology and check so to dissuade it from consuming time they require it to be up to the teams to review the decision, hence the name Decision Review System, they only get 2 or 3 reviews per innings and if you review a decision and are wrong you lose one. If you review correctly you keep the review so if you think you're correct and the umpire's made a poor decision you should check it with the technology. This has the advantage of making it more part of the game and more agency in the hands of the players instead of it being more random and up to the referees. This might be a slightly unfair dynamic since it means that fans will blame their team rather than the officials.
Human Factor
Sports is about people, flawed as they are. It's ok for decisions to be made that are wrong occasionally. Of course you want decisions to be correct and fair as much as possible but there's always going to be mistakes, whether by the players or by the referees. The pursuit of a kind of perfection in decisions can be debilitating to the sports experience in my opinion. To reflect this human element, cricket has a concept called umpire's call in LBW decisions. Since there's some margin of error on the Hawk-Eye decision, if the result is close it defers back to the umpire on the field and what they decided. Additionally if the footage is inconclusive the television umpire tends to just go with what the umpire thought live. This keeps the part on the field relevant which makes it feel more enclosed and important. In contrast with football, it feels like when the referee goes over to view the screen and watches it in slow motion they're inevitably going to overturn their decision made previously. Additionally it feels silly to call offsides via VAR when they're only offside by a minuscule margin even if it's technically the correct call. In my view this cheapens the relevance of the onfield decision making.
One of the controversies in DRS being introduced in cricket was that one of the tenets of cricket is to respect the umpire and their decision. The `Gentleman's game` label is a little mythological; many of the great cricketers in the past have been liars and cheats just as much as any other sport, but there is something to be said for respecting the officials even if you disagree with the decision. The kind of disrespect of the referees that you see in football is frustrating and it leads to things like diving or exaggerating injuries in order to get favourable calls which is very frustrating to view as a spectator. As long as the officials aren't corrupt abuse is way over the line for the things that they do.
Cost of the technology
The technology can be quite expensive to install and operate , since in some cases it needs quite powerful technology and additional staff. Obviously this isn't a major issue for events like the Football World Cup but it does lead to a divide where the technology can actually affect the way the game is played. As a concrete example from cricket, you're more likely to be given out LBW when reviews exist since it can be difficult for umpires to predict them live so it requires a different technique to try to avoid it from happening. That's not ideal since you want the game to be mostly the same across levels of the game.
The drama
In these sports the technology actually becomes part of the drama, although it can detract from it as well. Waiting for the technology to load or to view the replays can be nerve testing, especially when it comes at a point when the game is on the line. However I think it also detracts from the spontaneity of the live sport. This is more important for a sport like football in my opinion because goals are so important. The act of celebrating a goal only for it to be disallowed after half a minute due to a tiny offside or minor foul earlier can be very deflating. In my view fans generally will accept it if there's a clear mistake, for example a clear handball like Maradona's Hand of God. When it's debatable or marginal it feels pointless though; it also invites accusations of inconsistency since it's very difficult to judge everything the same way when there's a high amount of discretion involved.
Conclusion
Like most of my opinions, I actually don't have a strong, clear conviction on these systems. I do tend to believe it works better in cricket than in other sports but that's more of a consequence of the nature of the game rather than more competent administration. I think there's a lot of issues with them but also some advantages and I tend to be able to see different people's positions. I don't have a clear grasp on public opinion but given Andy Burnham has said in interviews that they should stop using VAR in football , I suspect that's a popular opinion. Either way, remember to be cordial and understanding, which is a much sappier ending than I expected for this post but I really just wanted to get this rant out there.