Have the changes to Refereeing gone too VAR?

Football and the digital economy are two concepts which at first glance do not appear to sit hand in hand. Football, and more specifically football refereeing, depends on the presence of soft skills such as communication, judgement, team-work and decision making (Doyle, 2020). You would therefore be forgiven if you were under the impression that refereeing has been relatively untouched by the digital economy.

Traditionally, programming AI to think beyond simple and routinised decision making and subsequently implementing this at a real time level has been difficult. However, technology has changed the job role of a football referee in many ways, with the implementation of goal-line technology in 2012, the introduction of communication systems amongst referees in 2006 and the introduction of Video Assistant Referee’s (VAR) in 2018 being three of the most recent examples. The implementation of this technology, particularly the latter, has been met with resistance. Thus, it is interesting to consider: in what ways has technology changed the job of those holding the whistle (both on and off the pitch)? And how much further can technology go in replacing human judgement in the game loved by so many?

Technology has improved the job role for referees in a number of ways. The new communication systems have (obviously) improved the ability of the match officials to work and communicate as a team. Goal line technology and VAR have similarly improved the accuracy of decisions and so have worked to reduce human error – arguably benefitting referees, players and fans alike.

 On the surface, this acts as good evidence for the way that technology and AI are increasingly encroaching more aspects of our lives. Contrary to popular assumptions, AI is not just good at routinised behaviour such as acting as part of an assembly line. Now, it assists judgment and the decisions made in many industries, including sport. This is supported by Brynjolfsson and McAfee (2014) in their book: ‘The Second Machine Age: Work, Progress and Prosperity in a Time of Brilliant Technologies’ who suggest that despite common belief, developments in technology have improved the ability of Artificial Intelligence (AI) to compute high level reasoning with very little computation. AI may therefore progressively play a role in supporting occupations where decision making based on learned rules is key to the job role – such as refereeing.

By improving the accuracy of decisions, technology has taken some pressure off of referees in what is an extremely high-pressure environment. After THAT game against Germany in the world cup of 2010 the referee and his two linesmen were under police protection as they left the match following the controversially disallowed goal which was (clearly) over the line. The heartbreaking moment can be seen above.

With the introduction of Goal-line-technology, this level of human-error has been eradicated from the game. Decisions which were once subjective and based purely on human judgement have become objective through the introduction of technology. This proves so important for referee’s, where the pressure is so great that ‘big errors often produce an emotional fallout that hurts a lot’ (Sutcliffe, 2019). Technology has therefore acted as a lifeline for referees where the high levels of scrutiny experienced after a wrong decision can have huge impacts mentally. One only needs to complete a brief search on Twitter and the evidence for why is outstanding:

The rise in social media and digital technologies brings new meaning to the phrase ‘everyone’s a critic’. Referees are experiencing higher levels of scrutiny (and abuse) than ever before as a result of social media and this is something that is certainly having an impact on the profession. Ex premier league referee Madley has frequently spoken out against the abuse received by refs on social media.

 The digital world empowers fans and places referees under higher levels of scrutiny than ever before. Ironically, the implementation of more digital technology could be the answer to protecting referees – where abuse is now aimed at technologies such as VAR rather than falling on the referees shoulders.

Undoubtedly, technology and the digital economy will continue to have great impacts on refereeing as a job role. Much like it is impossible to predict what cars will look like in 30 year’s time, or accurately forecast the mobile phones of tomorrow, it is difficult to make assumptions on how specifically technology will further change the game. However, there is an argument that technology such as VAR should be taken back out of the game to reshape the referees job for the better.

This brings forward the question: Can technology ever replace human judgement? If, after examining the implementation of VAR, the answer is no, then perhaps refereeing needs to be taken back to basics: a reinvention of the job where the digital economy has far less impact. I would argue that the humanistic refereeing errors are a suitable price for fans to pay to maintain the thrill of the game.

Perhaps then, the digital economy has changed the game too far – bringing with it inhuman levels of objective judgement for decisions which are subjective in their nature. In the future, refereeing may be further changed by the digital economy, with AI offering an abundance of solutions. However, can technology ever replace human judgement… and has technology in football gone VAR enough?

References:

Byrnjolfsson, E. and McAfee, A. (2014): ‘The Second Machine Age: Work, Progress and Prosperity in a Time of Brilliant Technologies’ 

Doyle, A. (2020): ‘What are Soft Skills?’. Accessed on 10th Feb 2020 from: https://www.thebalancecareers.com/what-are-soft-skills-2060852

Sutcliff, S (2019): ‘Mistakes, abuse & VAR: What are the pressures on a premier league ref?’ Accessed on 12th Feb 2020 from: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/47690634

Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (2019): ‘Business Basics: Attitudes to Adoption’ (PDF) Accessed on 11th Feb from https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/838473/attitudes-to-adoption.pdf