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Referee Rob Styles has apologised to Bolton for awarding a penalty to Manchester United when it was plain to all that the tackle had been fair. There is no word on Bolton’s response. However there is a bigger issue.

Does an apology close the incident, or should more be done about decisions such as this one? It is a harder question than you may think. When all is said and done, the referee is only human and human’s make mistakes. In fact, on a football team there are 11 players, all of whom make errors in a game, often more than one or two.

Before the advent of television, decisions like this were always the subject of discussions, however no one knew for sure. With television, we get to see these incidents ad nauseum and from every possible angle.

Referees are human. They will make mistakes. We do however have the technology to resolve some of these situations. There are many sports that now use what is known as a ‘video referee’ or ‘video umpire’. There role is to assist the onfield official by viewing video an incident and advising them. It has worked well in some sports, not so well in others.

The arguments against the use of video are compelling. In sports where they are used, they do slow the game down considerably, particularly when every second offense is referred. This brings in the second argument, which is, what decisions should be referred?

I would be interested to hear your opinions. Have you experienced video use in the decision making process? Did it work? Read my buzz post on SportsViews and add your opinions, or better yet, create your own little buzz - we would all like to see your opinions.

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