The Offside Trap: How VAR Is Reinventing the Laws of Physics

VAR is not improving offside decisions — it’s inventing a new sport

Every weekend, a goal is disallowed because a striker’s kneecap or armpit is millimetres beyond a defender’s heel in a frame chosen by a technician in Stockley Park. This is not precision. It is a farce that is rewriting the laws of football.

Before VAR, offside was a game of judgement

For 150 years, the assistant referee decided when a player was offside. The law was clear: a player is offside if any part of the head, body or feet is nearer to the opponents’ goal line than both the ball and the second-last opponent. The key word is ‘nearer’ — not ‘a toenail ahead’. The spirit was that a clear, daylight advantage was needed. In 2019-20, before lockdown, only 12 goals were disallowed for offside via VAR. Last season, that number rose to 37. The game has not changed. The technology has.

The Premier League’s own data shows that the average time to check an offside goal has increased from 31 seconds in 2020 to 78 seconds today. This is not efficiency. This is a bureaucratic paralysis.

The freeze-frame fallacy: why stopping the clock is wrong

The root of the problem is the frame selected for the offside call. The VAR chooses the exact moment the ball is played — but that moment is not a single frame. The ball travels over a distance of several centimetres between frames, so the choice of frame determines whether a goal is allowed. In 2023, a study by the University of Bath found that at 30fps, the ball can move up to 15cm between frames. The margin of error for offside decisions is supposedly 5cm. So the system is inherently flawed.

In Liverpool’s 5-1 win over Chelsea in August, Mohamed Salah’s goal was ruled out because his heel was offside. Replays showed the pass left the passer’s foot at different points in different angles.
In the North London derby in September, Gabriel Jesus had a goal disallowed when his shoulder was deemed offside — yet the frame chosen showed the ball still on the passer’s foot, not after it had travelled.
In a January match, Newcastle’s Alexander Isak had a goal ruled out when his big toenail was ahead of the last defender. The assistant referee had kept his flag down.

These are not mistakes. They are the logical outcome of a system that treats 30 frames per second as absolute truth.

The defence: “It’s the law, get over it”

Proponents argue that the law is clear and that VAR merely applies it consistently. “If the armpit is offside, it’s offside,” they say. But that misses the point: the law was never designed for millimetre precision. The original law said “nearer” — not “any part of the body excluding the hands and arms”. The 1990 amendment clarified “any part of the head, body or feet” — again, not the armpit. The idea that a player gains an advantage from having his shoulder ahead of a defender’s hip is absurd. Football is a game of movement, not static geometry.

Moreover, the Premier League’s own guidelines state that “if the two players are level, the attacking player is onside”. Yet the “level” concept has been abandoned. In 2019-20, the league instructed VARs to use “daylight” — a gap between the attacker and defender to give the benefit of doubt. That was scrapped in 2021. The result? A 300% increase in offside calls. This is not interpretation; it is a policy change masquerading as technology.

The verdict: Semi-automated offside is not the cure

The Premier League will introduce semi-automated offside technology in 2025, using 12 cameras and limb-tracking data. It will reduce the wait time, but it will not fix the frame-selection issue. The system will still require a human to press “start” when the ball is kicked. And that moment is subjective. The automated system will just make the inconsistency faster. I predict that in the first season of semi-automated offside, at least 20 goals will be overturned incorrectly — and the league will refuse to release the full data. The technology will become a shield, not a scalpel. The Premier League will have to choose: accept a margin of error, or keep pretending that millimetres constitute fairness. They will choose the lie.