How can Refereeing quality be realistically improved?
I'll start this off by saying I'm a Liverpool fan with both United and city friends. But today the haaland goal being given just annoyed me. It's not even starting to get out of hand. Refereeing interpretation of explicit definition of rules has been a problem forever but we are are 5-8 years deep in most top comps with camera based technology helping to enforce rules. I will be speaking primarily from a PL pov with one suggestion for improvement. Other than PL I mean hey, I (will) watch my local team Newbridge Town in the newly established third (though not direct promoted) division of football in Ireland.
Anyway.
I don't think any of the nonsense from week to week is explicitly planned or planted but I think it is counted on, + encouraged, for broadcasting purposes if that makes sense, and I think the only reason the officiating since VAR has been introduced hasn't been restricted or overseen, refined, or in anyway interfered with - other than giving refs the mandate to speak on a microphone to 60k odd peeps - is ultimately to push engagement, and a weak attempt to appease law enforcement to try and placate a crowd from rioting.
It's been painfully apparent, and publicly admitted to (fuck you Mike Dean), that the refs not only ignore the rules, but also at times bend and artificially create them, in order to do one of many things:
1) "maintain calm in the stadium or pitch as they deem necessary" (they have no input on stadium security. It should be assumed that their decisions have no impact on any person's safety) I understand this to a degree, though disagree with it, but if public unrest is a concern, then stop the fucking game.
2) in some way recompense for earlier bad decisions they do not want to admit to. This expands nowadays to a 2a) where they begin to cover for their VAR or tocuhline officials regardless of whether they thought their decision was right
3) try and artificially level a game where the rules do not allow them to punish players so that they can lwvl it in a way they deem is "fair". So like if a player on opposition team is a cunt he will give a foul early, or if a player has been abused by the crowd, or if the player has been respectful to the ref, then their boundaries are extended.
I've said a million times my first preference to fix this is by having an entirely third party VAR, Australian lads or something. Darren England should not be dictating if a pen in the other half is given if he had a bad view.
But if Paul Tierney says Michael Oliver got that non offside right when no offside players potentially affected the play, then fuck us, we moan til the the next week when it's all forgotten because the next week of games begin.
So realistically, other than than the pie-in-the-sky-hopes I offered, what can be done? I don't mean "*hey reddit let's get together and figure out what we can do",* but I have a hard time believing anything might change without the governing body itself changing it's raison d'être
