VAR chaos: is football turning to cricket to uncover referees' secrets?

The fan in the dark: why does television hear what the crowd in the stands is denied?

One decision from the video assistant referee can change a result, ignite the anger of thousands, and fuel debate for hours and days. The irony? The fans who paid their money to be there in person are often the last to know what happened behind the scenes.

Old Trafford served up exactly that during one of the most controversial VAR incidents in recent years. All 74,161 spectators watched Manchester United face Manchester City, yet none of them knew what was really unfolding during the review of Erling Haaland's goal.

Michael Oliver blew his whistle and awarded the goal. What most of the crowd never grasped was that the offside call at the heart of the review had nothing to do with Haaland. It concerned Enzo Fernandez.

Viewers at home fared far better. They got the full picture of what took place during the review of the goal that handed Manchester City a 1-0 win.

Here lies the great irony of the video technology age: "The fan watching the match from home sometimes knows more than the fan inside the stadium."

This isn't only about the big calls that overturn results. On Saturday, Axel Disasi, the Crystal Palace defender on loan from Chelsea, was sent off as his side lost 3-2 to Ipswich Town.

Disasi stood at the touchline for more than a minute while VAR reviewed the red card. Everyone waited to see whether the referee would stick with his decision or reverse it.

Nobody inside Selhurst Park got an explanation. Supporters had no idea what the VAR had said, what he had seen, whether the referee was hesitating, or even whether the review concerned the decision itself or some other detail in the incident.

Almost ten years have passed since VAR arrived at the highest levels of football, and the fan in the stands still feels like a second-class citizen when it comes to understanding the calls that decide a match.

Television commentary teams occupy a unique position in all this. They can hear what the VAR is saying and follow the discussion between the video room and the on-field referee.

That access lets commentators and pundits pass on part of the context to viewers at home. The supporter in the stadium, though, is often left staring at a giant screen showing a replay or some graphics, with no sound of the dialogue that ultimately settles the decision.

One question grows more pressing with every passing year: "Will football ever reach a stage where it trusts fans enough to allow them to hear directly what the video technology officials are saying?".

Other sports have gone further down this road. So why can't football?

Howard Webb took charge of the referees' committee in the English Premier League in 2022 with a promise: greater transparency and openness in officiating. He has delivered real progress along that path.

"Match Officials Mic'd Up", the programme that airs conversations between referees and Video Assistant Referee technology, broke new ground among Europe's major leagues.

Nobody should be surprised Webb went down this road. He'd headed up refereeing in America's top football league, and that experience shaped his thinking.

Back in 2019, the American league became the first to share VAR audio publicly after full-time through its "Inside VAR" programme.

That programme was the blueprint that later inspired "Match Officials Mic'd Up" in the English Premier League. Moving from post-match reveals to live broadcasts during a game, though, was an entirely different story.

Several bodies and leagues pushed to broadcast the VAR conversations live. None got there. The evidence points to a stalemate, with a number of leagues and the lawmakers unable to agree on the step.

Webb sat on a working group that tried to loosen the restrictions on using audio recordings, clearing a path towards live broadcasts in the future.

The International Football Association Board, the body that writes the laws of the game, and FIFA in particular remain a long way from signing off on full disclosure. The same worries surface every time anyone floats amending the rules.

Communication quality varies wildly across different parts of the world. Referees could face extra pressure during reviews, and their image and credibility might take a hit. The nature of some VAR decisions complicates matters further still.

Plenty of calls hinge not on a clear-cut fact you can prove but on personal judgement and interpretation. That's why two people can watch the same footage several times and still disagree.

Three years ago, Lukas Brud, the secretary and chief executive of the International Football Association Board, spoke to "BBC Sport" about the possibility of broadcasting audio recordings live. His stance laid bare the scale of the concerns inside the bodies that run the game.

Opening up audio communications to the public in real time could spark a kind of "chaos", he argued, because so many people are involved in the conversation, with voices and information flying about during short, tense moments.

Howard Webb brings a different experience to the table, one that makes him among the most qualified to talk about this. He is the only head of referees to have actually lived through broadcasting video technology conversations live during matches.

Back in August 2020, during the "MLS is Back" tournament staged after the coronavirus pandemic forced a stoppage, the American league became the only competition to broadcast video technology conversations live during matches.

The experiment was brief. Yet it was judged a success. Nearly six years on, no other competition has tried anything similar. Rather than becoming a model for the rest of world football to follow, the American trial remains a limited page in the history of video technology.

Webb insists the matter cannot move forward on one man's say-so. The refereeing body in the English Premier League cannot take a decision of this kind alone, because any real change needs a broader consensus over the laws of the game and how they are applied.

The Premier League has pioneered plenty when it comes to video technology, yet other major leagues have overtaken it in several key areas.

English football rolled out fresh innovations this season. Cameras mounted on referees, dubbed "RefCam", now beam a live audio feed, and transcripts of the conversations between the video assistant referee and the on-field official have been published too.

Referees announcing video technology decisions to the crowd themselves also arrived early here, with the Premier League among the first competitions to try it.

That step marks a rare win for fans inside the ground. At least they get a direct explanation of the decision rather than simply watching the replay on the giant screens. Progress remains limited, though, because the "Match Officials Mic'd Up" programme still surfaces only once a month.

The season's first episode airs on Tuesday, an ideal chance to present the audio relating to the offside decision on Fernandez. Here's the snag: several controversial incidents have already come and gone with their audio recordings kept under wraps.

Consider Harry Maguire's handball before Manchester United's goal against Ipswich Town, or the penalty Arsenal never got against Aston Villa.

Both incidents sparked fierce debate. Yet weeks slipped by without the public hearing any audio to clarify how the referees thought, what the video assistant referee said, and why the decision landed as it did.

This is precisely where the Premier League can sharpen its approach to transparency. The issue isn't necessarily making everything available live. It's the speed of releasing information once the event has happened.

La Liga offers a different model. There, the audio and video relating to video technology interventions that demand a personal judgement from the referee get published, meaning the incidents where the on-field official heads to the pitchside screen to review footage and reach a fresh decision.

Crucially, these recordings land on social media a few hours after the final whistle. Not after weeks. Fans can make sense of the controversial calls while the argument over the match still rages, rather than waiting until the moment has lost most of its bite.

Serie A has gone another way. It scrapped the "Open VAR" programme, the Italian answer to England's referees' conversations show, at the end of last season. The move followed the pressure the programme piled on officials.

Germany has no permanent programme dedicated to presenting the details of video technology, though that could change in the coming seasons. The Bundesliga sticks to sharing audio only when necessary or when incidents genuinely warrant clarification.

No unified global model for handling video technology audio exists, then. Each league follows its own vision, split between those who favour wide disclosure, those who release only specific recordings, and those who steer clear of live broadcasting altogether.

Football may one day broadcast video technology conversations live. That prospect feels distant, and even if it arrives, nothing about it would be simple. Genuine practical obstacles remain.

Most reviews and checks happen while the match is still going on. Expecting commentators to fall silent every time the video technology room begins reviewing an incident would be unrealistic.

Fans themselves don't necessarily want the atmosphere interrupted again and again just to hear video technology discussions. Other situations are different, though. Sometimes the match has already stopped.

Take Manchester City's goal. That was exactly the kind of case that could provide a suitable model. So why not broadcast the audio at least in moments like those?

Here's the problem: the video assistant referee gets to work almost the instant an incident occurs. Wait for the right moment to relay the audio to viewers, and the broadcaster may already have missed an important part of the exchange.

Discussions can begin before the broadcast producer even realises the review will matter enough to show. Coordinating between the video room and the television broadcast could therefore stretch the delay rather than shrink it.

The delay tied to video technology is a problem in its own right. Add another layer of waiting, this time for a signal from a director or programme producer to start broadcasting the audio, and the whole experience grows more complicated. But perhaps there's a way to solve it.

The most realistic scenario may be to broadcast the video technology audio live only when the referee heads to the pitchside screen. That way, the situation becomes clearer and better organised.

Everyone knows a review is underway. The referee stands in front of the screen, the match is stopped, and the fans wait for the decision.

Broadcasters could then air the conversation between the referee and the video assistant referee in a way that closely resembles the live reviews of the Decision Review System in cricket.

This model may work better than trying to broadcast every conversation inside the video technology room.

Australia's league has already taken a step in this direction. When the referee heads to the pitchside screen to review an incident, the stadium's giant screens show exactly what he is watching.

Even there, though, the audio stays silent. That reveals a problem which isn't merely technical. The issue isn't the ability to transmit the image or the sound, but how far the game's decision-makers are willing to let the public access details that until recently stayed among the officials.

Fans, in the end, will remain deprived of hearing what happens in many controversial situations, even when they sit just a few metres from the referee.

Football has long trailed a number of other sports in harnessing technology to give supporters a greater understanding of what is happening.

Yes, Video Assistant Referee technology has changed the game, and yes, the Premier League has taken important steps towards greater transparency. Yet the gap between what the television viewer knows and what the fan inside the stadium knows remains considerable.

Here lies the paradox: the technology meant to make decisions clearer may leave the fan in the stands feeling greater uncertainty. "He sees the referee waiting, he sees the players waiting, he sees the screen showing the replay, but he does not know what is being said, he does not know what the referees are discussing, and he does not know why the decision is taking all this time."

The real question now may not be whether football can broadcast the audio of video technology, but rather: "When will it decide that the fan deserves to know what is happening?" So far, the road to that moment looks a long one.

Roughly ten years have passed since video technology entered football, yet the idea of hearing "VAR" conversations live remains closer to the exception than the rule.

A genuine opportunity still exists for the Premier League to take a further step here, not necessarily by opening up all communications on air, but by speeding up the release of the recordings, widening the scope of transparency, and giving the crowds inside the stadiums the same information viewers get at home.

The technology exists. The recordings are already being made. Some leagues have proven they can be published. So the question left hanging in the dark is: "Why does the fan still not get to hear?"