{"id":3212,"date":"2026-06-14T13:12:28","date_gmt":"2026-06-14T13:12:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/?p=3212"},"modified":"2026-06-14T13:12:28","modified_gmt":"2026-06-14T13:12:28","slug":"world-cup-2026-was-this-offside-technology-fault-leaves-questions-over-var-images-in-switzerland-draw-with-qatar","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/?p=3212","title":{"rendered":"World Cup 2026: Was this offside? Technology fault leaves questions over VAR images in Switzerland draw with Qatar"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\"><b class=\"ssrcss-1xjjfut-BoldText e5tfeyi3\">Was Switzerland&#8217;s Remo Freuler offside before he was brought down by Qatar goalkeeper Mahmoud Abunada?<\/b><\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">It is the question that, for many, remains unanswered despite Fifa finally releasing images four and a half hours after the incident happened.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The move led to a penalty, converted by Breel Embolo, as the teams drew <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.com\/sport\/football\/live\/c4gy0jy8dglt\" class=\"ssrcss-18834jl-InlineLink e1kn3p7n0\">1-1<\/a> in Saturday&#8217;s World Cup Group B match in Santa Clara.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Before the tournament Fifa put a lot of stock in its new, enhanced semi-automated offside system.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">World football&#8217;s governing body scanned every player at the World Cup to create unique, lifelike avatars.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">It was supposed to provide the most accurate illustration of offside decisions we have ever seen.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">But it did not work and Fifa had to revert to drawing lines to the players and on the pitch.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Fifa released a statement saying &#8220;a brief technical outage prevented the onside animation graphic from being generated&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">It went on to say the lines drawn by the video assistant referee (VAR) showed no offside and released two images &#8211; which remain unconvincing &#8211; but not the usual avatar graphics.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Within the move, two Switzerland players could potentially have been offside.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Fifa released an image for both as evidence they were onside. The first was for Embolo in the build-up, the second for Freuler before he was fouled by Abunada.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Fifa&#8217;s statement read: &#8220;The workflow of the VAR was not affected by this issue and followed the normal procedure in checking the on-field decision. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;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.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The semi-automated technology is not flawless. It can be impacted by many things, such as players being close together or even something as random as ticker tape on the pitch.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">When the technology fails in the Premier League there is the option to fall back to the old technology where the VAR draws the lines. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">But the offside image is produced straight away, not several hours later.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;We all think (it was offside),&#8221; Gary Neville said on ITV before the statement was released.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;Everybody at home thinks it. Fifa are the host broadcaster and they have the semi-automatic decision that they can show us.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;There is a massive question over that because it is offside in my eyes until they prove to me different.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">If there is one thing that is guaranteed to create doubt it is delay. It creates a vacuum that feeds conspiracy theories. It might give the impression Fifa is hiding something.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Was Switzerland&#8217;s Remo Freuler offside before he was brought down by Qatar goalkeeper Mahmoud Abunada? It is the question that,&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3213,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pagelayer_contact_templates":[],"_pagelayer_content":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3212","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sport"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3212","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3212"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3212\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3213"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3212"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3212"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racingsport.xyz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3212"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}