What to do with the Goal Review System?

[bulldogtragic]

Its either scrap it, or pump a huge amount of money into it.

In 2016 Grand Final, JJ wrongly had his late goal overturned. No improvement.

Meddled for years. Now 2021 Semi Final overturn Bontempelli’s goal on blurred vision and alleged deviation. Nothing conclusive which is the alleged test to overturn goals.

Equally bad is goal umpires not making painfully obvious calls. Smith’s first goal had no defender within 70cm or so and no one claiming it. Why is the game so long?? Why can’t Goal umpires make such obvious calls. What is even worse is where it’s a behind or Mark and the player can’t launch a rebound because we need to waste 30 seconds allowing teams to set up behind the ball.

The system was designed to overturn howlers, but how frequently is that happening? It used to be when a goal was called there’s a review automatically in the dead time for Ch7 sponsors. Now the game is stopping before a decision being made.

I always felt the AFEL was chasing DRS in Cricket and Hawkeye in Tennis. But it’s a very different game. I don’t see what it’s adding from 2016 JJ to 2021 Bonts. It’s slowing the game up, making errors and penalises clubs in instances wanting to launch a quick rebound but can’t. Josh Bruce had an obvious goal overturned this year, I think against Carlton. The system is meant to eliminate bad decisions, but is proactively creating howlers against players who have kicked a goal according to the on field umpire and goal umpire.

So do we try to fix it at the edges? Pump millions into technology to make it work better? Or kill it and make goal umpires do their jobs and reduce wasted time?

[GVGjr]

Agree BT, either scrap it or make as close to fool proof as you can.
I'll wear the odd mistake and the waiting on a decision is excessive

[bornadog]

I prefer to forget about it and let the goal umpire make the call. It wastes a lot of time, it holds up play and a team can lose some momentum in the meantime.

[westdog54]

It's not fit for purpose in its current state. The footage quality is nowhere near enough to support good decision making. We're rocking and rolling horrendously blurred footage looking for bent fingers.

The problem is the stereotypical supporter isn't mature enough to accept that one day an officiating error will change the result of a big game and that's the reality of sport.

[Yankee Hotel Foxtrot]

Unless they can find a reliably better technology (and in the case of Goal line review I don't think it's possible) then just get rid of it, and make the goal umpires earn their pay. I'll wear the odd error.

[DOG GOD]

I’d use it for touched on the line and nothing else..
The zoom of touched ball in play is Z grade quality.

[Yankee Hotel Foxtrot]

I’d use it for touched on the line and nothing else..
The zoom of touched ball in play is Z grade quality.

I reckon the touched on the line technology can lead to some really farcical situations ... trying to track the position of a 3D object in motion against a 2D line is comical.

[bulldogtragic]

And the curve ball example. Cordy’s touch on the line a few weeks ago. On review he was hit high, a free kick.

That’s like in cricket reviewing an LBW but a ‘no ball’ is discovered.

Surely a review of everything immediately in the time of review is relevant. If there’s a clear breach of the rules before the ‘all clear’ is given would necessitate a free kick being awarded and no score. But they’re happy to guess and overturn, but happy to ignore what is clearly visible. Imagine if DRS said we don’t look for ‘no balls’.

I can live with human error by umpires. But unnecessary errors introduced into the game I can not.

[bulldogsthru&thru]

It’s pretty simple. If it isn’t blatantly obvious, go with the original call. It’s there for the obvious like Hawkins poster in the 09 grand final. Don’t go guessing shit or overturning what looks like something. If you can’t see it in 10 seconds move on.

Now, goal line technology needs an overhaul. Get it smarter so that we’re not looking above the line on an angle making calls.

On the whole I agree. Pump money into it. How can we watch blurry vision for touched balls. I’ve said it before, it’s embarrassing watching a goal review.

[westdog54]

It’s pretty simple. If it isn’t blatantly obvious, go with the original call. It’s there for the obvious like Hawkins poster in the 09 grand final. Don’t go guessing shit or overturning what looks like something. If you can’t see it in 10 seconds move on.

Now, goal line technology needs an overhaul. Get it smarter so that we’re not looking above the line on an angle making calls.

On the whole I agree. Pump money into it. How can we watch blurry vision for touched balls. I’ve said it before, it’s embarrassing watching a goal review.

FIFA don't have cameras in the goalpost, they have them set back so that there's a clear line to compare against.

Either get it right or get rid of it.

[jeemak]

I think better graphics and marketing gimmicks are where I'd start. I definitely wouldn't invest in the appropriate technology to make it work.

[ratsmac]

Bonts overturned goal was total BS.

For starters a goal umpire shouldn't be allowed to ask to check for a touch off the boot 40 metres out. That should be a field umpires call. The goal umpire is there to check if the ball goes through the big sticks, hits posts or touches on the line. The rest is for the 3 field umpires. I don't mind arc generally but if they are overturning stuff like Bonts one the other night they have to scrap it.

Mind you I believe that it Bonts was touched just going by his non celebration and Gardeners instant hand in the air. But that's the only evidence I have and it's speculative

[angelopetraglia]

It should stay. However they need to emphasise the rules in when it is to be used. There needs to be 100% proof that a wrong decision has been made to overrule the umpire. Not a sign of a small deflection or possibly half a finger moving. 100% proof that everyone would agree with.

It should be there to fix the howlers like Tom Hawkins hitting the post in the 2009 Grand Final. It should not be used for borderline decisions that fans will argue over for years like JJs overturned goal in the 2016 Grand Final or Bont's overturned goal on the weekend. All we are doing in that instance is taking the debate over the umpires on field decision to the video umpire. The video umpire's decision should be beyond approach. We do that by being clear to everyone that they will only intervene when it is absolutely clear.

[Happy Days]

I watched it back in the cold light of day. The ball deviates, it was a good decision.

[mjp]

Goal Review: Chuck it in the bin.

If you want a list of all of the other rules and supposed initiatives that should be put in the same bin - starting with the ridiculous stand rule - I'm here for you.

[Ozza]

I'm not a fan of video review in sport. I hate it in cricket and think it has not added to the game. Similar with AFL.

I get that you want to wipe out the obvious ones, like Tom Hawkins' in the 2009 grand final where it was clear as day that it hit the post - of course those should be reversed. But looking at whether a player got a finger tip on a ball 40 metres out from goal is surely not what we want to be looking at. How many goals in the history of the game had a finger tip on them from a snap.

And the goal umpires now never have the confidence to make a call on anything. Probably the most frustrating examples are when its either a mark or a behind - and we wait a minute or two - and the defensive team is disadvantaged while the opposition gets set up to defend.

[Boots]

Max Barry made the excellent point on the Squiggle blo (https://squiggle.com.au/a-novelists-guide-to-suspense-in-football/)g that goal reviews are an abomination when it comes to 'narrative tension'. Here's the most important bit (though the whole post is kind of cool):


Bad Suspense #1: The Goal Review
Woo boy.


To be fair, let’s declare up front that the Goal Review isn’t supposed to create suspense. It’s supposed to reduce umpiring error. In a little while, I’ll attempt to convince you that this is far less important than it seems. But first let’s just tally up the damage it does to good suspense.

The Goal Review attacks the moment of resolution: the instant that tension turns into something else (ecstasy, despair). A football match lasts for a couple of hours but has a relatively small number of key moments, where tension is spiking because the play may be about to result in an important goal. These moments are an immensely valuable opportunity to reward the audience by releasing the tension they’ve built up.

...


It’s unsatisfying for fans on both sides because the Goal Review tells us that the tension we just resolved is actually getting resolved the other way, in retrospect. In storytelling terms, this is a little like an after-credits scene where the bad guy turns out to be not dead after all. Even when it’s the result you wanted, it’s not satisfying and it doesn’t feel right.


So first, we have the emotional resolution being stretched out from a single moment (great!) to a minute or two (awful). The crowd’s tension turns into the bad, self-aware kind, where they know they are subjected to an artificial pause and nothing is actually happening. The sharp emotional peak is gone; instead, we have a valley of frustrated waiting between two low hills.


Second, the act of resolution shifts from the field to the scoreboard, where the audience has to look to see which word will be flashed up on the screen. This strikes me as like the hero going home after fighting the bad guy and waiting for a phone call to confirm whether he won.


Third, no goal is safe! The audience can’t safely celebrate (or grieve) any goal unless and until it becomes absolutely clear that it won’t be reviewed. The mere threat of a review can turn quick, satisfying resolutions into slow, frustrating ones.

A secondary frustration is the dumb way the reviewer says the rationale for the ruling then says 'decision on the scoreboard' and we have to wait three more seconds for the stupid graphic to resolve when we already know the answer. The whole thing is egregiously stupid.

I think the part of the Lions game on Saturday that made me yell hardest at the TV was the goal review on JJ's goal. And I didn't even have to wait for the review to get mad at it, it made me mad the second they went to review because I'd have to sit through agonising frame-grabs in 'boomerang' mode while some fatuous airhead form the CH7 "commentary" team farted out their stupid and irrelevant feelings about it.

It's a terrible system. Just scrap it and go back to the old MkI human eyeball. On the plus side, we could supplement "we wuz robbed" umpire-bashing post mortems with endless debate about the goals the other team shouldn't have been given if only there was a review system.

[bulldogsthru&thru]

Bonts overturned goal was total BS.

For starters a goal umpire shouldn't be allowed to ask to check for a touch off the boot 40 metres out. That should be a field umpires call. The goal umpire is there to check if the ball goes through the big sticks, hits posts or touches on the line. The rest is for the 3 field umpires. I don't mind arc generally but if they are overturning stuff like Bonts one the other night they have to scrap it.

Mind you I believe that it Bonts was touched just going by his non celebration and Gardeners instant hand in the air. But that's the only evidence I have and it's speculative

Bonts overturn should have stood as a goal. Was it touched? Maybe. Going by his non-celebration it probably was. But there’s no way known it was an obvious deflection. The ball had just come of his boot so like you said, it’s all speculation.

I just can’t understand how the AFL continues to cock this up. The guessing and making decisions on faulty logic does my head in. We brought it in so that obvious mistakes wouldn’t cost teams a game let alone a premiership. We’re now in a situation where that very system will end up costing a team a flag. I still get nightmares thinking about what if moments from JJs overturn.