on display now

You're not wrong! How is that a penalty, not a great advert for VAR.

I thought this was going to be about Jean Luc Besson's film "Le Grand Bleu" or the French word for Miscellaneous and what do I find? A statement of the obvious.

Who does he think he is Nicky Southall?

I'm already regretting picking Argentina to win. Scott Harrison could teach their defenders a thing or two.

Alain Prost was my favourite French Driver.........I'll get me coat!

Jacques Cousteau

Do I get a prize?

Monsieur le Muff.

VAR is fucking bollocks I hate it spoiling the World Cup but the penalties given by it today were both Penalties but the France one would by given by one ref in ten I reckon, and nobody would complain if it wasn’t on the pitch. It took an ultra slow motion replay. That is not Football.

I just cringe at the refbrunning off and looking at that little tele, Danny Baker said on Twitter today that it’s the type of thing that the Americans would have suggested when trying to introduce things to make our game better in the 90’s that we’d have laughed out of Town. He’s right.

Watch England get a penalty from it tomorrow and we all change our tune!

Emanuelle in Bangkok..top film.

If it stops outrages like Lampard's goal that never was (yeah, I know, that's one for goal line technology) and the hand of God it'll do for me. Refs screwing up in World Cup Finals is not preferable!

That BBC England manager documentary last night was a hard watch, especially the years after 96. The most consistent thing apart from repeated England failure was the utter incompetence of the FA. Worth watching for the Sven and Capello interviews though!

You have answered your own question though, video technology works for matters of fact ie. line decisions like goal line and offside. That’s progress as you don’t want to see an injustice like the Lampard ‘goal’ again. It has no place in the game for anything else though and it’s absolute bobbins, you just know (and sort of hope) a classic World Cup ‘moment’ is going to be ruined by it at some point during this tournament referees decisions are part and parcel of the game I hate the fact they just about every goal is now shrouded by slight uncertainty until some blokes locked in a room have seen the replay. It’s sucking the joy out of the game. The sight of defenders making ‘TV’ gestures to ref when they have conceded because they reckon one of them got a slight push boils my piss. All because that Doctor Evil character Infantino who was sandwiched between the Saudi Crown Prince and Putin stroking a cat (probably) at the first game thinks it’s a good idea.

Blatant handballs like Maradona's or Henry's against Ireland aren't covered by those technologies. We've managed to live with a review system in other sports and I'd prefer to see rank bad decisions overturned in footie too.

Admittedly borderline incidents (the sort that divide MOTD panelists every weekend) are going to waste a lot of review time and create controversies of their own. Personally I think defenders should get the benefit of the doubt every time a review isn't a straightforward case of 'the officials got it wrong.'

2 examples in over 30 years, referees are rarely going to miss such blatant things but it’s a fair point, I still hate it. To be honest even though I’ve got used to it I don’t like DRS in cricket. Imagine it had been in during 2005 Ashes the if Jason Gillespie has reviewed his caught behind at Edgbaston it was not out as his hand wasn’t on the bat the Aussies go 2-0 up and the greatest series never becomes the greatest series. Gillespie even said he had no problem with decision and would have felt hard done to if he’d been bowling and it wasn’t given. That was like that France penalty the other day, yes technically it was a penalty but had it not been given very little would have been made of it.

Human error, taking points and howlers are all part of sport for me. One good thing that’s happened so far and I don’t know if it’s linked is that far less bookings seem to be getting dished out and we have no sendings off yet, it could be coincidence but that is good if it continues.

Of course it was not sure why I said Gillespie!

A slight segue because it was mentioned above but the England documentary last night was excellent, well worth a watch on iplayer for those who didn't catch it. One thing that stood out for me when you put them in sequence is how many goalkeeping errors England have had in qualifying or major tournaments in recent years, shockers! Much more of those than the blatant errors we can complain about like Maradona's handball or Lampard's 'goal'.

Back to VAR I'm also in the bobbins camp, horrible idea removing all spontaneity out of sport which is the joy of it and not even really fixing some of the debate on the decisions. For example PJ has mentioned the France penalty, for me that was never a penalty no matter how many times I have watched it (defender got touch on ball first so for me irrelevant that momentum created contact afterwards). I might be wrong in my opinion but VAR hasn't taken the contention out of the picture using that example.

I'm also in agreement on DRS, massive celebration for wicket followed by review process which takes the joy out of the moment. In fact all it has proved is that in most cases the Umpires in cricket are pretty excellent!

There were 3 or 4 England goalkeeping howlers in the documentary and 2 refereeing travesties of justice.

And PJ, it might be 2 examples in 30 years as far as England and Ireland fans are concerned, but there's bound to have been similar refereeing injustices affecting other national sides around the world.

In other sports like rugby, cricket or tennis the crowds get to see what the referee is looking at on the big screens inside the grounds. It actually becomes part of the excitement of the spectacle of the game. For the ref to run off the pitch to look at a small screen in a booth without the crowd seeing the same pictures is just daft. In rugby it is normally the ref who asks for a review if he's not sure for a try and his question determines what can be looked at and on what basis his original decision can be overturned. The only exception is, I think, for dangerous play when things might be brought to his attention by the review ref.

I think the England game tonight highlighted perfectly why it’s utter bollocks, has no place and is totally subjective. Tunisia were awarded a penalty for about the only time ever got in England’s box and it was barely anything never mind a foul, yet at nearly (crucially only nearly) every England set piece Kane was wrestled to the ground. Surely if you are using VAR and they are saying that the Walker challenge is a penalty then some consistency in the game has to be applied? It’s not doing anyting about howlers or injustice, maybe let’s just add deliberate handball to line decisions and then scrap this half baked nonsense??

The thing is those are starty-stoppy sports with lots of natural breaks. Even so, despite what, 17 years of TMOs in rugby union, the jury is still out. As many people hate them as like them. The consensus seems to be they are fine provided your team comes out tops. I personally find the referee's drawing a screen with his hands after seemingly nearly every try abusive.

See the wankers at it again, I fucking despise cheating and these feigning bastards, especially Umtiti, I hope a slow painful injury is forthcoming

They parked the bus much better than Tunisia did. But apart from that, impressive they were not.
I still haven't seen a team that England have any reason to fear. Besides maybe England.