A technical failure may have cost the Newcastle Jets in their 1-0 loss to the Melbourne Victory in the Grand Final of the A-League.
The Football Federation Australia (FFA) has admitted to an embarrassing error that swung the biggest game of the 2018 A-League season.
"A technical failure in theVAR system meant that the Video Assistant Referee did not have access to the camera views which would have enabled him to make an offside ruling in the 9th minute goal scored for Melbourne Victory by Kosta Barbarouses," the FFA said in a statement.
FFA's Head of the A-League Greg O'Rourke said that according to the technology partner Hawkeye, the capture software that uploads the broadcast feed into the VAR system was partially lost 30 seconds before the Victory's goal due to a malfunction in the software.
"We are extremely disappointed at this failure of the VAR technology," O'Rourke said.
"And we understand the disappointment and frustration of the Newcastle Jets, their fans and indeed all football fans.
"VAR was introduced here and in other parts of the world as a technology based solution to correct the human errors that inevitably are made from time to time when officials are making judgements in split seconds.
"On this occasion the technology itself failed and the broadcast angles required were unavailable. We are working with Hawkeye to thoroughly understand why it did and what can be done to prevent this happening again.
"Whilst we understand that this happened only once this season it was at a most critical time. All parties desire the technology to be failure proof and that is what we will be striving for."
"This is important not just for the Hyundai A-League but for other leagues around the world and for the 2018 FIFA World Cup in Russia at which VAR will be used for the first time."
The Victory made history by coming from fourth on the table to be crowned the A-League champions defeating the Jets in a chaotic stop-start final.
After the match, Jets coach Ernie Merrick attacked the video review system after seeing his side go down to a goal that should have been disallowed.
"Once they got the goal, Victory set out to stop us playing and it was very stop start," said Merrick after the match.
"They packed the defence and played a lot of long balls in the second half. We controlled the game, just look at the stats – twice as many shots on goal.
"With the goal, it looked like three players were offside, in which case I wonder what the point of the VAR is. I'm still a fan of the video referee, but what's the point if they don't see that?"
