The 2026 World Cup, which was supposed to be a grand stage for football, has instead turned into proof that technology is not always the solution. The presence of the Video Assistant Referee (VAR), originally designed to minimize fatal refereeing errors, has now transformed into a boomerang considered to shackle the beauty and spontaneity on the pitch.
Overly deep and forensic technological intervention has triggered a series of controversial decisions that have harmed many national teams, such as Egypt and Croatia. The use of highly sensitive ball sensors and the review of incidents long before a goal is scored are deemed to have exceeded the basic essence of refereeing. As a result, the flow of the game is frequently disrupted, creating massive frustration for both players and spectators.
Sharp criticism has come from various quarters, including former professional referees and artificial intelligence practitioners. They assess that FIFA's efforts to pursue perfect fairness through data have instead led to inconsistency. Perceived injustices, ranging from disallowed goals to debatable red cards, have fueled wild speculation about match-fixing behind the monitor screens.
Although FIFA, through Referees Committee Chairman Pierluigi Collina, insists on maintaining the protocol, dissent on the field is hard to suppress. For many observers, football is a game intrinsically linked to human error, which is precisely part of its charm. The ambition to create absolute precision with technology has, in reality, eroded the emotion and human spirit that for 150 years have been the soul of the world's most popular sport.
