Whitey Grandad

What a carve up. What kind of democracy is this supposed to be?

No we're not. Even here it's not entirely clear whether the defender scrapes the ball. A stupid lunge to make, mind you.

The WA is much deeper and wider than a simple FTA.

The WA is an indefinite extension except that legally we are out of the EU. Brexiteers say "that's tantamount to remaining' Remainers say 'in that case we might as well remain'

You voted for the fudge. All you did was put a tick in a box, you didn't specify what you wanted.

He doesn't have to do anything to get a no-deal. It is the default event and the only things that can stop it is ratifying the WA, revocation or him asking for an extension and the latter two are down to him. A General Election might be forced on him but otherwise he could sit on his hands. At least that might keep them out of mischief.

No it wasn't. The referee didn't think so. The forward was hardly touched,if at all, and was lunging forward trying to reach the ball. What VAR now means is that every game will have several penalties and every penalty is going to be scored even if it has to be retaken several times. It distorts the whole purpose and balance and tempo of the game.

Because we are a football club and you can't play football without players. If Bertrand goes for around £15m then who are we going to get of the same quality as a replacement?

I'm not as certain as you that it should have been a penalty. The defenders right leg might have come into contact with the back of the attacker's leg but was it enough to send her flying? This is the problem with TV, you can't judge the strength of any small touches.

Worse than disgusting. It’s almost as though the VAR refs are doing it to make a point. It’s not even completely clear that the goalkeeper is ahead of the line when the first penalty is taken. It could be that her left heel is in line with the goal line which would make her position legal. All this rubbish is destroying the beautiful game. When you think of all the great goals that have ever been scored there isn’t one penalty amongst them.

You’re most welcome. It’s some time since I blew my own whistle (no s******ing there at the back) and they keep changing the laws and the official international of them but thro ins haven’t changed for a while. It’s a bit of a strange one because the white lines are considered to be part of the area that they surround so that would make the touch line part of the main field of play and you’d think that the thrower would not be allowed to tread on it.

Stuttering is legal but encroachment isn’t and from what I’ve heard there was quite a bit of that,

The big toe can be over the line, nothing wrong with that. As long as some part of the foot is touching the white stuff then it’s a legal throw. Even if it’s only the back of a heel and the rest of the foot is well into the green it’s ok. Law 15: “Must have part of each foot on the touchline or on the ground outside the touchline”

They are good referees. Just because you don’t agree with their decisions doesn’t change that.

You’re quite right but of course the yellow line is in fact parallel to both the goal line and the 18-yard line. The offside law was never intended or designed to be used with technology. It is a vague law with a lot of latitude and was only introduced originally to prevent goal-hanging. In my view anything within a foot or two is fair game. Fortunately these days we don’t have sequential-scan cameras because they can introduce an offset between the too and bottom of the screen. I agree with you, in my days of running the line if you had to think about it then you played on. The game needs a rapid and clear decision or else the whole tempo is smothered.

That's disgraceful and is as good an argument against VAR as you could find.

Of course it won't rdeuce errors. It just pushes the decision onto another referee who isn't at the game and has a much poorer view of the action.

Every time he plays fullback. Away to Newcastle a few sesons ago is a good example. Those of us who used to play in that position are probably more sensitive to his failings than others.

I’d rather they spent it on Hoedt.

As a fullback Targett is a massive downgrade on Bertrand. As a left midfielder he’s not bad but equally he’s not great. He doesn’t have the positional sense to guard our flanks and a straightforward give-and-go will get past him every time. He can’t play tight marking because he doesn’t have the speed and if he stands off the other winger will just skim past him. Great header at the end of last season though.

That was a very good case for VAR, but according to that logic we would have got a draw after 90 minutes. Leaving aside the fact that if we’d been awarded that goal then the game would have followed a different course subsequently.

These are all very good points. I have never been a fan of it because it destroys the flow of the game. It should never be used for subjective decisions such as handball, except perhaps for incidents such as that ‘handball goal’ away at Watford. I don’t like the way that it distorts the decisions taken, or rather not taken, by the officials at the game. The assistant referees on the line are instructed to keep their flags down for offside and wait to see what happens in the belief that VAR will take a decision later. As East Kent Saint says above, the offside law is not suited to VAR. Without a gridiron pattern on the pitch the camera images are not accurate enough to judge whether or not a toe is offside for a fraction of a second. Slow motion replays should never be used for any penalty decisions because they give a false impression of the incident. There is also a lot more information that the referee sees such as where the players’ eyes are looking, what they might have said previously and sometimes the sounds that may occur. Whenever the pitch referee is advised to go and look at a replay he is then under pressure to change his decision because usually in such situations he would be overruling his bosses. I’m not a fan of it.

People on the radio who use that irritating uptalk? You know, the way of speaking that’s really annoying? It makes every sentence sound like a question? It's usually young women who do it? But not always? Anyone who uses the word ‘like’ all the time. Like, every other word.

Remarkable, but hot actually legal

Now you're getting above my pay grade but You're probably right: "After joining from Ipswich for an £8million transfer fee in 2015, the centre-back suffered a knee ligament injury on his Cherries debut, which kept him out for more than a year, while he was ruled out for eight months with a back problem last season." https://www.bournemouthecho.co.uk/sport/17664648.tyrone-mings-believes-aston-villa-loan-has-refreshed-his-career/