The Briefing: Will Arsenal and Liverpool rue their draw and is it time to bin VAR?
By Nick Miller
Welcome to The Briefing, where every Monday during this season, The Athletic will discuss three of the biggest questions to arise from the weekend’s Premier Leaguefootball.
This was the weekend when Crystal Palacefinally got their first win, Tottenhamprobably played their worst game of the season, there was a clutch of result-changing, stoppage-time goals, Brentfordand Ipswichplayed out a thriller, and Cole Palmeronce again made his case to be the best player in the league.
Here we will ask if both Arsenaland Liverpoolwill be disappointed with their draw, why VAR can’t be scrapped when it is adding errors to the game, and whether it’s already too late for Southampton…
Follow live reaction to the news of Manchester United sacking Ten Hag
Will Arsenal and Liverpool live to regret their draw?
It was a slightly odd game at the Emirates on Sunday.
On the face of it, a 2-2 draw between two of the best teams in the league looks like a terrific tussle. Four goals. Both Mohamed Salahand Bukayo Sakascored. One team took the lead twice and the other equalised twice. Are you not entertained?
Well, no. Not really. There were pockets of exciting play and some phenomenal moments of individual skill, not least the graceful yet brutal efficiency of Saka’s early strike, the sweeping move for Salah’s late equaliser, or the sensational cross from deep by Declan Riceto locate Mikel Merino’s head for Arsenal’s second.
But overall it was… maybe not quite boring, but certainly not as diverting as the bare facts might suggest.
It was also an odd game in that both teams might well come away thinking that they have missed a great chance to not just claim three points, but get one over on a near rival as they both fight to take down Manchester City.
For Arsenal, any side that takes the lead twice at home and doesn’t win should be disappointed. Yes, they were without William Salibaand lost Gabriel to injury in the second half, so from that perspective you might argue — and not without good cause — that a point against the league leaders is a good result.
But their performance in the first half was so impressive that they could/should easily have been further ahead and Liverpool were disjointed enough in parts to suggest Arsenal could/should have won it in the second half, too.
And yet, at times after the break, they resembled a team with 10 men playing with their backs to the wall, desperately trying to hold out for a point. This was understandable given that after the 54th minute and Gabriel’s departure, they didn’t have any of their first-choice back four — either on the pitch or in their preferred position — but it’s for that reason that Liverpool will feel like they could have done more, too.
This was a wounded major rival there for the taking, not necessarily playing badly but significantly depleted. Thus, Liverpool only being able to muster four shots on target in over 100 minutes of football should be a big disappointment.
You can flip all of those arguments around and use them to argue that this was actually a pretty good point for both sides, but they both know that every point is crucial with City still looming. This feels like a missed opportunity for them both.
Why can’t we accept that VAR is making the game worse?
The argument in favour of VAR came in the closing stages at Stamford Bridge when a marshmallow-soft penalty awarded to Chelseawas correctly overturned. Had technology not been in place, an incorrect decision would have stood and technically an injustice would have taken place.
But if that was a quiet, considered case for VAR, an absolutely howling scream against it came across London, as West Hamwere given a penalty against Manchester Unitedthat not even Danny Ings, the man supposedly fouled, seemed to think should have been awarded.
This isn’t necessarily a foolproof method of judging these things, but the fact that none of the West Ham players appealed for the penalty should be a fairly decent indicator that it wasn’t the clear and obvious mistake the officials seemingly deemed it.
United fans should be irritated on two levels: firstly, that the penalty was awarded against them, from which West Ham scored the winner; secondly, that it gives Erik ten Hag and (perhaps more pertinently on this occasion) their players an excuse for an incredibly profligate performance and fourth defeat in nine this season.
But the wider point, for the rest of us, is what this tells us about an innovation that was supposed to have improved the game but is actively making it worse.
Maybe this is naive, but we should be able to deal with people making mistakes. Everyone does. Players. Managers. Referees. Even journalists, if you can imagine such a thing. It’s part of human fallibility and we all should know it’s inevitable, especially when the mistake is a refereeing decision made at first glance, with the action being as quick as a Premier League game is.
It’s less easy to deal with mistakes being artificially introduced where there was previously no opportunity for them to be made. VAR adds a needless layer of human fallibility, which because it comes in a more controlled environment (the theoretical calm of a room in Stockley Park, as opposed to the frantic middle of a football pitch), allows for conspiracy theories to fester.
You can blame the on-pitch referee, David Coote, for this decision; it doesn’t happen often, but referees can and do take a look at the screen and decide they were right the first time. Coote should have been stronger, but he wouldn’t have been put in that position had Michael Oliver, the VAR, not absurdly decided that the incident cleared the ‘high bar’ for overturning decisions.
Two minutes and 34 seconds passed between the incident and the penalty being awarded. Four minutes and six seconds elapsed between the incident and the penalty being taken. Is disrupting nearly five per cent of a football match worth it even when VAR gets the decision right? It definitely isn’t when it doesn’t.
The idea of VAR eradicating all mistakes was always going to be fanciful, but we were told that the disruption to the game would be worth it for the calls that were corrected. If this sort of thing happened in VAR’s first couple of seasons, then it could be written off as a teething problem, but this is its sixth season in the Premier League and it’s not getting any better.
Some may argue that this situation just shows this system merely needs to be improved. What is more true is that the system is always going to make the game worse. But even more true than that is this situation shouldn’t really make much difference to the conclusion: VAR should be abolished as soon as possible.
Despite Pep’s praise, is it already too late for Southampton?
Post-match praise from Pep Guardiola can be a double-edged sword.
He tends to reserve it for teams that his Manchester City have just smoked but played the game in a way he finds pleasing. City didn’t steamroller Southampton this weekend, but his appraisal of his opposite number Russell Martin still felt like a patronising pat on the head.
“It’s a good game to learn as a manager,” he told the media after the game. “I am going to learn a lot with Russell because they did really well. The way they played, they are so demanding. They defend with the ball… and they are really good (at it), one of the best in the Premier League.”
This is all very well and good and merely losing 1-0 to City when you’re the worst team in the division might actually provide some encouragement to Martin and his team. Undoubtedly there are positives to take.
But despite this praise, it might already be too late for Southampton. When measuring the worst sides in Premier League history, Derby County’s 2007-08 vintage are always whatever the opposite of the gold standard is.
It is our solemn duty to report that even they had a better start to the season than Southampton currently have.
Russell Martin’s men are the fifth team in Premier League history to have only one point from their first nine games. All of the others were relegated. The points total required to avoid the drop has been going down and down over the years, from the magical ’40 points’ mark a couple of decades ago, to the mid-30s, to last season when just 27 would have been enough to survive.
And yet, even to reach that number from this stage, Southampton will need to pick up points at just under one per game. If the points total is slightly more in line with the seasons before, then Southampton will essentially need to play like a mid/lower-mid table side for the rest of the season to stay up. Does anyone really have any confidence that they can do that?
Perhaps something will click against either Evertonnext week or Wolvesthe week after. Perhaps they will improve and start picking up wins. Perhaps they will gain encouragement from the fact that many of the other strugglers aren’t looking so hot at the moment either.
But, despite being anointed by Guardiola, even at this early stage of the season, it feels like they’re already too far gone.
The Briefing: Will Arsenal and Liverpool rue their draw and is it time to bin VAR?
By Nick Miller
Welcome to The Briefing, where every Monday during this season, The Athletic will discuss three of the biggest questions to arise from the weekend’s Premier Leaguefootball.
This was the weekend when Crystal Palacefinally got their first win, Tottenhamprobably played their worst game of the season, there was a clutch of result-changing, stoppage-time goals, Brentfordand Ipswichplayed out a thriller, and Cole Palmeronce again made his case to be the best player in the league.
Here we will ask if both Arsenaland Liverpoolwill be disappointed with their draw, why VAR can’t be scrapped when it is adding errors to the game, and whether it’s already too late for Southampton…
Follow live reaction to the news of Manchester United sacking Ten Hag
Will Arsenal and Liverpool live to regret their draw?
It was a slightly odd game at the Emirates on Sunday.
On the face of it, a 2-2 draw between two of the best teams in the league looks like a terrific tussle. Four goals. Both Mohamed Salahand Bukayo Sakascored. One team took the lead twice and the other equalised twice. Are you not entertained?
Well, no. Not really. There were pockets of exciting play and some phenomenal moments of individual skill, not least the graceful yet brutal efficiency of Saka’s early strike, the sweeping move for Salah’s late equaliser, or the sensational cross from deep by Declan Riceto locate Mikel Merino’s head for Arsenal’s second.
But overall it was… maybe not quite boring, but certainly not as diverting as the bare facts might suggest.
It was also an odd game in that both teams might well come away thinking that they have missed a great chance to not just claim three points, but get one over on a near rival as they both fight to take down Manchester City.
For Arsenal, any side that takes the lead twice at home and doesn’t win should be disappointed. Yes, they were without William Salibaand lost Gabriel to injury in the second half, so from that perspective you might argue — and not without good cause — that a point against the league leaders is a good result.
But their performance in the first half was so impressive that they could/should easily have been further ahead and Liverpool were disjointed enough in parts to suggest Arsenal could/should have won it in the second half, too.
And yet, at times after the break, they resembled a team with 10 men playing with their backs to the wall, desperately trying to hold out for a point. This was understandable given that after the 54th minute and Gabriel’s departure, they didn’t have any of their first-choice back four — either on the pitch or in their preferred position — but it’s for that reason that Liverpool will feel like they could have done more, too.
This was a wounded major rival there for the taking, not necessarily playing badly but significantly depleted. Thus, Liverpool only being able to muster four shots on target in over 100 minutes of football should be a big disappointment.
You can flip all of those arguments around and use them to argue that this was actually a pretty good point for both sides, but they both know that every point is crucial with City still looming. This feels like a missed opportunity for them both.
Why can’t we accept that VAR is making the game worse?
The argument in favour of VAR came in the closing stages at Stamford Bridge when a marshmallow-soft penalty awarded to Chelseawas correctly overturned. Had technology not been in place, an incorrect decision would have stood and technically an injustice would have taken place.
But if that was a quiet, considered case for VAR, an absolutely howling scream against it came across London, as West Hamwere given a penalty against Manchester Unitedthat not even Danny Ings, the man supposedly fouled, seemed to think should have been awarded.
This isn’t necessarily a foolproof method of judging these things, but the fact that none of the West Ham players appealed for the penalty should be a fairly decent indicator that it wasn’t the clear and obvious mistake the officials seemingly deemed it.
United fans should be irritated on two levels: firstly, that the penalty was awarded against them, from which West Ham scored the winner; secondly, that it gives Erik ten Hag and (perhaps more pertinently on this occasion) their players an excuse for an incredibly profligate performance and fourth defeat in nine this season.
But the wider point, for the rest of us, is what this tells us about an innovation that was supposed to have improved the game but is actively making it worse.
Maybe this is naive, but we should be able to deal with people making mistakes. Everyone does. Players. Managers. Referees. Even journalists, if you can imagine such a thing. It’s part of human fallibility and we all should know it’s inevitable, especially when the mistake is a refereeing decision made at first glance, with the action being as quick as a Premier League game is.
It’s less easy to deal with mistakes being artificially introduced where there was previously no opportunity for them to be made. VAR adds a needless layer of human fallibility, which because it comes in a more controlled environment (the theoretical calm of a room in Stockley Park, as opposed to the frantic middle of a football pitch), allows for conspiracy theories to fester.
You can blame the on-pitch referee, David Coote, for this decision; it doesn’t happen often, but referees can and do take a look at the screen and decide they were right the first time. Coote should have been stronger, but he wouldn’t have been put in that position had Michael Oliver, the VAR, not absurdly decided that the incident cleared the ‘high bar’ for overturning decisions.
Two minutes and 34 seconds passed between the incident and the penalty being awarded. Four minutes and six seconds elapsed between the incident and the penalty being taken. Is disrupting nearly five per cent of a football match worth it even when VAR gets the decision right? It definitely isn’t when it doesn’t.
The idea of VAR eradicating all mistakes was always going to be fanciful, but we were told that the disruption to the game would be worth it for the calls that were corrected. If this sort of thing happened in VAR’s first couple of seasons, then it could be written off as a teething problem, but this is its sixth season in the Premier League and it’s not getting any better.
Some may argue that this situation just shows this system merely needs to be improved. What is more true is that the system is always going to make the game worse. But even more true than that is this situation shouldn’t really make much difference to the conclusion: VAR should be abolished as soon as possible.
Despite Pep’s praise, is it already too late for Southampton?
Post-match praise from Pep Guardiola can be a double-edged sword.
He tends to reserve it for teams that his Manchester City have just smoked but played the game in a way he finds pleasing. City didn’t steamroller Southampton this weekend, but his appraisal of his opposite number Russell Martin still felt like a patronising pat on the head.
“It’s a good game to learn as a manager,” he told the media after the game. “I am going to learn a lot with Russell because they did really well. The way they played, they are so demanding. They defend with the ball… and they are really good (at it), one of the best in the Premier League.”
This is all very well and good and merely losing 1-0 to City when you’re the worst team in the division might actually provide some encouragement to Martin and his team. Undoubtedly there are positives to take.
But despite this praise, it might already be too late for Southampton. When measuring the worst sides in Premier League history, Derby County’s 2007-08 vintage are always whatever the opposite of the gold standard is.
It is our solemn duty to report that even they had a better start to the season than Southampton currently have.
Russell Martin’s men are the fifth team in Premier League history to have only one point from their first nine games. All of the others were relegated. The points total required to avoid the drop has been going down and down over the years, from the magical ’40 points’ mark a couple of decades ago, to the mid-30s, to last season when just 27 would have been enough to survive.
And yet, even to reach that number from this stage, Southampton will need to pick up points at just under one per game. If the points total is slightly more in line with the seasons before, then Southampton will essentially need to play like a mid/lower-mid table side for the rest of the season to stay up. Does anyone really have any confidence that they can do that?
Perhaps something will click against either Evertonnext week or Wolvesthe week after. Perhaps they will improve and start picking up wins. Perhaps they will gain encouragement from the fact that many of the other strugglers aren’t looking so hot at the moment either.
But, despite being anointed by Guardiola, even at this early stage of the season, it feels like they’re already too far gone.
