It has taken time, and it has taken a lot of back and forth, but the straw that broke the camels back finally came yesterday.
Now, many may think that it was the Kulu-pen not given or the Van de Ven-offsidegoal that was the straw? No, not alone.
But yesterday summarized both everything VAR was supposed to fix, but has not, _and_ the new issues it has created.
1. Not a level playing field: At one point in the game, the norwegian commentators claimed that Michael Oliver had been good, he had been "very close to every and all big situation where he had to make a call". True. He was close to the situations. But each and every one of them up untill the VAR penalty went Arsenals way.
In a thightly contested game like yesterday you would expect these to be more equally distributed. Not neccessarily 50/50, but closer. I can't remember a single one prior to the VAR penalty going against Arsenal.
So has VAR leveled the playing field? Nope. If anything, it has made it _easier_ for the ref to just take the route of least resistance.
2. The offside goal: One of the main arguments used about VAR was to remove the "endless discussion" about was it/was it not offside. As yesterday (and many many other days) show, we're _still_ discussing was it/was it not, _and_ we're discussing VAR itself. So we've not removed anything, we've just added yet another stupid distraction point.
3. Absurd situations: Arsenal are deadly on corner/free kicks. In about the 53th minute Vicario made a brilliant save, and the ball went out to a corner. In the situation leading up to the corner, the Arsenal-player may/may not have been equally much offside as VdV was. However, since Vicario saved, no VAR check. If Arsenal had scored on the resulting corner, we would have been better off if he had just let the ball go past him on the first attempt, for VAR to go back and remove it. Of course, no sane person would do that, but it just shows that VAR has leveled nothing, solved nothing.
4. The Kulu-pen: For as long as I can remember, the mantra about clipping heels by accident has been that it is the player crossing behind who is "responsible" for not causing the player in front to clip his heel. However, yesterday, it was more a "OH, but he didn't really mean it, and he _barely_ touched him. The ref clearly thought it was not enough." So a subjective decision made by the onfield ref, not overturned by VAR because it was not "big enough" an error. Arsenal scored on the breakaway instead. If that is not a "big enough" error, nothing ever is.
VAR has to die. In it's present form, it has got to die. Violently, and in flames. It has brought the game ZERO gain, but plenty pain.
I'm a tech guy. I love technological solutions to all problems, even those where you'd think tech had no right to even think about the problem.
But in this matter the tech is wrong.
Scrap it in its present form. Go back to the drawing board, bring back a new, improved, shiny VAR 2.5, where the tech is removed from the onfield ref. Give each team two or three challenges they can use in each game. If you challenge a decision on the pitch, the VAR steps in, and gives a verdict within 2 minutes. If it can't, the onfield decision stand. If the challenge is successful, the team keeps all three challenges. If it is unsuccessful, it "costs" you the challenge.
No more 8 minute waits for a decision, no more "delayed decision, since VAR will check it anyway." and no more armpit offsides.
I think the main problem is that the cost of developing VAR makes it more or less imperative that it is "visible" in the game. The system above would not be visible to the viewers, thus not create any publicity.