Former Premier League referee Jeff Winter has sounded a warning to PGMOL chief Howard Webb and believes VAR is undermining the organisation’s credibility.
Winter explained how VAR is making the job of refereeing unnecessarily more complicated and that officiating standards are dropping.
“VAR is not something I'm the biggest fan of, I never was,” said Winter in association with Freebets.com.
Jeff Winter explains inconsistencies of VAR
“There's inconsistency from week to week. Now, there's always been inconsistency, because one Premier League referee will see something one way from one angle, another referee will see it differently from another.
“But when you see in the same set of fixtures a player not being sent off for a really bad tackle, and then a player being sent off for something that most people would think is accidental.
“So, I think the credibility of PGMOL and its referees is very much in a dodgy position at the moment.”
Winter also highlighted his amazement that Wilfried Ndidi was not shown a red card for a challenge on Cole Palmer, and cites this as one example of many where VAR is not being used efficiently.
“In the Leicester-Chelsea game, there's a tackle made by Ndidi that to me was the clearest red card I've seen all season,” he added.
“Yet it's referred to VAR. Now things like that have got to be sorted out, otherwise referees’ credibility suffers and things aren't going to get better.
“I'd like to go back to basics. At the moment, we're just using VAR to justify its existence and they keep on saying we're not re-refereeing the game. From my perspective, that is exactly what they are doing.”
The former ref also discussed the topic of semi-automated offside technology (SAOT), which will not be introduced until at least next year.
Winter has concerns about potentially introducing the technology midway through the season and will create an uneven playing field.
“The thing that frustrates me about that is that if there is this system and it is foolproof, then why didn't they take it on board at the beginning of the season? I have a problem with things chopping and changing, and the tweaking of interpretations during the course of a season - how can that be fair?
“One team could lose a game at the beginning of the season because there was such a ruling in force, and then later on in the season, another team gets the benefit from it. It's been going on long enough now. We used to be at the forefront of refereeing here in England.
“We still have some very good referees, but overall, I think some of the European countries and others across the world have left us behind.”
