ไทย
English
中國人
FIFA has cited a "brief technical outage" to account for the absence of visual evidence surrounding the VAR ruling that granted Switzerland a penalty during Saturday's 1–1 stalemate with Qatar.
The Swiss were handed a spot kick 14 minutes in after Remo Freuler was fouled by Qatar goalkeeper Mahmoud Abunada. Replays seemed to indicate Freuler was in an offside position, yet a VAR review upheld the original call, allowing Breel Embolo to step up and convert.
With widespread bewilderment over what looked like an obvious offside, no replays were broadcast and no explanation was provided, leaving supporters and pundits thoroughly puzzled.
Several hours after Qatar's late leveler and the final whistle, FIFA turned to social media to justify the ruling and address the missing footage — though the statement did little to clear things up.
What Did FIFA Say?
FIFA, already under fire for publicly attempting to reconcile official attendance numbers against the rows of empty seats visible on the tournament's opening day, used social media to stand behind the contentious VAR call.
"During the Qatar vs. Switzerland match in the San Francisco Bay Area, a brief technical outage prevented the onside animation graphic from being generated ahead of the penalty awarded to Switzerland in the 14th minute," the statement read. "The issue was quickly resolved.
"The workflow of the VAR was not affected by this issue and followed the normal procedure in checking the on-field decision. The lines used by the VAR to check the position of the relevant players did not show the attacking player to be in an offside position in either of the two situations immediately before the penalty decision."
The issue, however, was that the statement was accompanied by still images from the match which, even with the offside lines overlaid, continued to suggest that Freuler was indeed standing in an offside position.
During the Qatar vs. Switzerland match in the San Francisco Bay Area, a brief technical outage prevented the onside animation graphic from being generated ahead of the penalty awarded to Switzerland in the 14th minute. The issue was quickly resolved.
The workflow of the VAR was… pic.twitter.com/ONpWxXDPE6
FIFA employs semi-automatic offside technology at this World Cup, with audio alerts dispatched to assistant referees when a player is more than 10cm offside. Crucially, Freuler fell below that threshold, meaning a manual VAR review was required.
The offside graphic is generated instantly, which is why many supporters felt the evidence should have been displayed immediately rather than being released hours after the final whistle.
SI answers is our AI answer engine trained on human-created content.
"It's like a dictatorship," a visibly frustrated Gary Neville told ITV's broadcast of the match. "The idea that they keep this evidence behind closed doors and don't show it to fans of the nations competing in the tournament is absolutely absurd.
"To not show the evidence of an offside ... prove to us that it's offside! Show it immediately. Why not have transparency?"