Bravo Motherwell, now other clubs must speak out on VAR

Bravo, Motherwell. The statement released by the club this week on the subject of VAR following the, eh, rather interesting officiating, shall we say, at Fir Park last weekend was bang on the money.

I’m not really one for clubs releasing statements around individual refereeing performances or bad calls that have been made within standalone games. Often, it can come across as playing to the gallery, and it is frequently deployed as a deflection tactic after a poor result or performance.

Normally, this sort of thing is the preserve of the Old Firm, with any calls that have been perceived to have gone against them naturally whipping up a media frenzy, with both sides of Glasgow adept at channelling that and turning the attention of their supporters’ ire towards the referees and away from the dugout or boardroom.

For me, though, the statement released by Motherwell this week around the two decisions that went against them in the Aberdeen defeat – the disallowed goal for an apparent ‘handball’ by Theo Bair and the denial of a penalty at the other end in the dying embers of the game after the ball had struck Graeme Shinnie's arm – struck the right tone.

READ MORE: Motherwell 0 Aberdeen 1: Clarkson hits winner as hosts denied by VAR

That's because it didn’t focus solely on the Aberdeen match, but highlighted the depth of supporter feeling around the bigger picture of what VAR and the ridiculous handball law are doing to the game.

For the record, in a sane world before we started poring over footage for the tiniest infractions, no matter how inconsequential they are to the subsequent passage of play, neither of the incidents mentioned are handballs.

Bair has no idea that the ball is about to strike him, coming as it is over the head of the Aberdeen defender in front of him, and his arm isn’t exactly outstretched in the air. It is, in fact, in a natural position for an attacker coming in at the back of a defender to challenge for the ball.

Over and above that, it isn’t even clear or obvious that it does indeed striker him low enough on the arm to constitute any sort of offence in any case.

It was a farcical decision, which was only compounded by the fact that the reasoning ran contrary to the specific explanation given to Stuart Kettlewell as to why a Ross County goal stood against Motherwell earlier in the season.

On that occasion, a handball by Vincent Loturi was deemed irrelevant as he was not the player who eventually scored. And that is what the IFAB rule states is the correct course of action.

Unless my eyes doth deceive me, it was Lennon Miller who then hit the shot that cannoned into the Aberdeen net off defender Angus MacDonald, so why Steven MacLean in the VAR room felt that he had to get involved, and why on-field ref Willie Collum deduced that the goal should be chalked off, is a mystery.

As for the Shinnie one, I again don’t think the ball coming off his arm in that manner should be enough to constitute a penalty offence, but these days, and having given the Bair one at the other end, how on earth you don’t even ask the on-field referee to review the incident is utterly baffling.

Kudos to Motherwell though for not allowing their statement on these issues to be dominated by the decisions of this game alone, and thus avoiding any credible accusation of sour grapes. No, this is a much wider issue, and the frustrations of fans over what VAR is doing to the game as a whole were articulated well by the club.

I often hear that VAR isn’t the problem, it is the referees operating it, and there is some merit in that argument. The standard of officiating in Scotland is an issue, and it has been for years.

But VAR has not only added a layer of confusion, it has further highlighted just how inconsistently the rules of the game are applied from official to official.

And its biggest offence of all is the joy that it sucks from football for those in the stadium. I was at the game on Saturday in the Cooper Stand, and even when Motherwell’s goal went in, I didn’t really celebrate it, just in case.

Sure enough, there was then an interminable wait as MacLean looked at replays to deduce if there was a reason to call Collum to the monitor, then another delay as Collum himself went for a look at the footage, before the goal was chalked off for reasons outwit the ken of anyone inside Fir Park apart from the men in black.

It’s a ludicrous situation, and I can’t be alone in feeling that it is diminishing my enjoyment of going to the game.

READ MORE: Let's hear 'Well Society case for taking Motherwell forward

Having taken this step to publicly question VAR’s role in Scottish football, my hope now is that the club will take it a step further and apply pressure to the league to hold a vote on whether or not we keep the technology after this season is over.

As the statement says, it is hard to find a fan who is now in favour of VAR, and the fans who go to games are surely the most important people in all of this. Not the officials who worry they might not get to major tournaments if we get rid of it.

In Sweden, the clubs are beholden to their supporters because of the 50 plus one ownership model. Their clubs voted against VAR, and attendances in the Allsvenskan are booming. Why are we in Scotland constantly told then that VAR isn’t going anywhere? That we must have it. Says who?

I can only hope that other clubs start following Motherwell’s lead, listen to their supporters, and push back against VAR’s insidious influence on our game.