Football referees give harsher penalties when watching slow motion replays
This football World Cup in Russia may be particularly harsh for players and there may be a lot more cards and penalties. Thanks to the Video Assistant Referee system introduced for the first time in a World Cup.
A study by the University of Leuven in Belgium found that football referees penalize situations more severely when watching them in slow motion compared to real time. In VAR decision will be taken from a control room by a team of four people analysing 33 camera angles. It is the discretion of the referee on the pitch whether he wants to go for VAR or not. But once he has opted for it, the VAR decision is binding.
Th harshness of the decision was particularly pronounced for high impact tackles. “In case of high-impact tackle incidents, there is a clear impact of slow motion, altering the judgment of the referees towards more severe disciplinary sanctions for the offending players…Viewing a situation in slow motion, compared with regular speed, increased the perceived intent of a violent action,” the study noted.
The study has been published in the open access journal of the Psychonomic Society, Cognitive Research: Principles and Implications.
Dr Jochim Spitz, corresponding author of the study, said: “Our results suggest that slow motion can increase the severity of a judgement of intention, making the difference between perceiving an action as careless (no card), reckless (yellow card) or with excessive force (red card). The finding that referees were more likely to make more severe decisions following slow motion replays, is an important consideration for developing guidelines for the implementation of VAR in football leagues worldwide.”
More red cards were given by referees watching in slow motion compared to those watching real time video playbacks
The researchers found no significant difference in the accuracy of a referee’s decision about if a foul had occurred or not, with slow-motion videos (63% accurate) compared to the real-time videos (61% accurate). However, the judgement of intention or force behind a foul differed. More red cards were given by referees watching in slow motion compared to those watching real time video playbacks.
The authors concluded: “ For certain types of situations and decisions, slow-motion video can be a helpful tool and be of value to increase decisional accuracy. By slowing down an image, it might become clear who initiated a foul, whether there actually was contact and whether a foul occurred either inside or outside the penalty area. However, judging human behavior and human emotion, such as intentionality, is quite another story. Based on our results we conclude that slow motion has an impact and can make the difference between perceiving an action as careless (no card), reckless (yellow card), or with excessive force (red card). Therefore, caution is warranted before adopting video technology and clear guidelines should be defined”.
