Present at a press conference to announce the players called up to face Malta and North Macedonia during qualifying for Euro 2024, Gareth Southgate took the opportunity to make a new rant about VAR. In the stands during the match between Tottenham and Chelsea on Monday evening, the England coach regretted the numerous interruptions of play and the endless consultations of the video by the match referee (9 in total). I got bored watching the match. “I was at the stadium and it just went on and on. So, without even thinking about the players, what about the fans? first launched the strong man of the Three Lions before continuing.
“The other side of the coin is that I think all the decisions made were right in the end. If that’s the aim of the game then fine, but it takes away all the flavor from the goals. And I think the actual playing time was incredibly low, even though we had 21 minutes of added time. There will always be decisions to make and interpretations to make. I think if you look for problems in the penalty area, if you want to scan any corner, etc. then we can give free kicks, penalties in both directions, easily. I wasn’t for (VAR) at the beginning and I didn’t see anything that could make me change my mind.”. We will still have to wait before seeing Southgate in favor of VAR…
