gannonball Posted March 17 Share Posted March 17 5 minutes ago, Dons_1988 said: What a presumptuous shit post ^ ^ ^ Isn't renewing either 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sortmeout Posted March 17 Share Posted March 17 (edited) 11 minutes ago, Dons_1988 said: What a presumptuous shit post You are doing some biting today mate. ETA - Just realised it wasn’t even your post I replied to. Holy f**k St Mirren fans have broken Aberdeen on here. Edited March 17 by Sortmeout 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Broughty Posted March 17 Share Posted March 17 Looking very likely it won’t bother us next year. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KingswellsRed Posted March 17 Share Posted March 17 1 hour ago, Dons_1988 said: I will happily contact my club (again) about this. I won’t threaten boycotting unless I mean it (not there yet) but I absolutely am willing to withdraw the free money I give them every month. Tbh I would do that about the broader direction of football in general, of which VAR is a symptom of, rather than a specific complaint about VAR. I feel very strongly about all of that (which possibly comes through in my grumpiness on certain threads). Not sure I could go on sportsound and keep my cool. I could already see them trying to drag the conversation into specific decisions and try and paint my views as a football fan moaning about referees. Sportsound absolutely love VAR as it means they don’t have to attempt to know things about Diddy teams. Out of interest, did you receive any form of response and if so, what method did you use to contact them? I emailed without a reply. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dav nan Gael Posted March 17 Share Posted March 17 Get VAR so far tae f**k !!! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dons_1988 Posted March 17 Share Posted March 17 1 minute ago, KingswellsRed said: Out of interest, did you receive any form of response and if so, what method did you use to contact them? I emailed without a reply. They phoned me chasing season ticket renewal in June/july and made the point then, it was prior to the vote. Response was pathetic tbh, just told me no other club was consulting fans and that it would be a light touch version of VAR. I also referenced it last summer when I threatened to cancel my AberDNA over the ridiculous colt team plan. The response then was much better in fairness and Renewed it then as they eventually came out against it. 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KingswellsRed Posted March 17 Share Posted March 17 Just now, Dons_1988 said: They phoned me chasing season ticket renewal in June/july and made the point then, it was prior to the vote. Response was pathetic tbh, just told me no other club was consulting fans and that it would be a light touch version of VAR. I also referenced it last summer when I threatened to cancel my AberDNA over the ridiculous colt team plan. The response then was much better in fairness and Renewed it then as they eventually came out against it. Interesting. It is certainly the opposite of “light touch” in reality. It only takes one club coming out saying they have consulted their fans and no longer support VAR to put the pressure on others to do thr same. Ultimately It might fail obviously but nothing to lose. 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
velo army Posted March 17 Share Posted March 17 "Never doubt that a thoughtful group of committed citizens can change the world, indeed it is the only thing that ever has". Margaret Mead. As @KingswellsRed says above all it will take is for one decent sized club to come out against it (no offence Morton fans) and the rest will start to follow. I saw recently that there was a poll of EPL fans and 1 in 25 fans (4%) were still in favour of it. This isn't getting much of an airing, but it should. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dons_1988 Posted March 17 Share Posted March 17 5 minutes ago, KingswellsRed said: Interesting. It is certainly the opposite of “light touch” in reality. It only takes one club coming out saying they have consulted their fans and no longer support VAR to put the pressure on others to do thr same. Ultimately It might fail obviously but nothing to lose. The ‘light touch’ comment was simply a lie, and I will be bringing it up with them again. Not that I didn’t know it was a lie at the time but think it’s evidently not now. I agree, Cormack is clearly not impressed and he’s a man who is influenced by fan opinion, let’s be quite honest. He could break with enough pressure. Fans weren’t consulted for a reason though at the outset, they knew we’d hate it but the decision had been made already, imo. And it wasn’t about fairness of decisions, it was about our standing on the continent with uefa and not being seen as a backwater league (spoiler, we still are). 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Les Cabbage Posted March 17 Share Posted March 17 (edited) 11 hours ago, HibsFan said: So yes, my story with taking action against VAR is pretty much entirely concentrated to 2022, when it was being floated, voted on and eventually implemented. Sent this email* to Hibs in April of that year and got nothing back at first. A snippet of the closing paragraphs below: *not posting the whole thing as a lot of it was just moaning at the club. Note on my boycott threat: due to personal circumstances I actually haven't been able to attend a game anyway since writing that email, so I've followed through on withholding my money from Hibs even if it hasn't been done purely on moral grounds. After VAR was introduced in October 2022, I went back to the email and realised that I had forgotten to include the SLO's email address and re-sent it (with some additional comments). To paraphrase, the SLO's reply was along the lines of: We were the last major league in Europe to introduce it so we could avoid some of the teething errors () Correct decision-making will help Scottish football to move forward and align us with counterparts in other countries There will still always be incidents, VAR can't resolve everything VAR in Scotland wouldn't have been stopped if Hibs fans had been consulted However I've passed on your feedback about supporters being consulted on issues such as this going forwards Anyway, I didn't bother replying and the post from V.G. jogged my memory that I had actually done it in the first place. Since then, I have mainly resorted to despairing and/or sniping from the sidelines. Is it petty? Definitely. Is it pleasing feeling entirely fucking vindicated by what I wrote in April 2022? Also yes. For people saying "oh how could we have seen what VAR would bring?", here's what I and many others were saying before the clubs had even voted: But V.G.'s post was exactly the shot in the arm I needed to remember what (admittedly little) I can do to try and turn the tide back in the favour of Scottish football fans who are sick and tired of VAR. I know that I am not alone in feeling like this, social media and forums such as this are awash with punters who would happily see the whole thing binned off. So, inspired by the above, I will be taking at least three of those four steps - currently being out of the country limits my chances of being able to call in to Sportsound any time soon - and I would implore others to do the same. The one thing I refuse to accept is that this is the status quo and there's no point complaining about it, we might as well get used to it. There are countless examples of the exact opposite of that sentiment being true, and if we can't overturn VAR completely we can at least make people in charge of it feel a lot less comfortable and smug about their pet project of sacrificing football fans on the altar of 'getting decisions correct'. Again, this thread is not for debating the merits of VAR. It's not for discussing any past, recent or future decisions made by VAR. It's not for suggesting alternatives to VAR. It's not for pondering whether it's the referees at fault rather than the technology. It's not for anybody other than those who feel the same as I do and want to discuss how we can take action, whatever your club may be. Three of the posters I agree with most on this issue (@VincentGuerin, @Dons_1988 and @AJF) support three of the four clubs I like the least in Scotland; it goes beyond any rivalries you may have. I know that there are people all across Scotland who just want to get back to attending a version of football that felt vaguely exciting and enjoyable. It sounds like we had a fairly similar experience. I emailed our SLO when the idea was mooted in October 2021, I got no response and 6 months later Hibs released a statement saying they strongly supported the introduction of VAR, our at the time manager Shaun Maloney was also moaning about the lack of it in the press. I got no response and after a VAR decision went against us I sent another email, probably in a bit of a mood so I could have worded it better with a clear head but like yourself I was utterly bemused by the running of the club and wanted to let off steam. This time I copied in the CEO, in fairness I did get a response back but the email didn’t address my issues really and also did contain a bit which completely contradicts the clubs position and to be honest I felt it was just lip service to a unhappy customer. Obviously Ron Gordon is mentioned in this but this was sent long before his passing. The CEO did offer a phone call to discuss it which I declined, I didn’t think it was going to achieve anything to take it any further at the time. I’m happy to contact the club again regarding my views on the matter, I don’t think I would withdraw financial support mind you, going to the football for me isn’t about supporting the club as much as it is the chance to see friends and have a laugh and that’s not something I’d want to give up. Edited March 17 by Les Cabbage 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SlipperyP Posted March 18 Share Posted March 18 The only time clubs will listen, is when fans don't turn up to games. Even better if fans do go to games that don't have VAR. (lower leagues) Telling their club, that they are still willing to pay money to watch football on a Saturday afternoon. Just without the VAR. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ahemps Posted March 18 Share Posted March 18 19 hours ago, velo army said: Anyone thinking that their email or activism on this issue (however small) won't make an impact need only look at the NRA in America. Their membership is pretty small (less than 1% of the population is a member) but their activity is constant. They attend meetings, they have orchestrated e-mail campaigns, but mostly they just do what the OP is suggesting and are fairly relelentless. The "pester factor" is a real phenomenon. Letters to newspapers (especially if we all wrote letters to the Daily Record, for instance, rather than various different ones) would give the impression of a groundswell of opinion against it. That's all that's required to get the conversation going. An impression of a backlash. It would hopefully get the Sportscene or Viaplay goons talking about it more critically. Sending an email takes a few minutes and it doesn't have to be something overly fancy. I'll email the Jags today. We're actually seeing our games affected by VAR in the upper league. Referees are taking more time to make decisions. Against Dunfermline we had one of those nonsense offsides where he waited until Graham had rolled the ball in before flagging instead of flagging immediately for Milne. In other words we've taken the decision for something to be implemented which certainly won't directly benefit us but which has absolutely made things a bit worse for us. Is this not really because they have some pretty big donors to the Republicans. The anti gun campaigners are probably a bigger pest but don't pay enough to have politicians in their pockets. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Leith Green Posted March 18 Share Posted March 18 Sadly I am in the "will do none of the above" category. While I think VAR in its current iteration is awful and makes the experience for fans dreadful, I dont believe the authorities have any inclination to do anything about it, nor will they take much account of what fans say. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lanky_ffc Posted March 18 Share Posted March 18 20 hours ago, velo army said: I'll email the Jags today. We're actually seeing our games affected by VAR in the upper league. Referees are taking more time to make decisions. Against Dunfermline we had one of those nonsense offsides where he waited until Graham had rolled the ball in before flagging instead of flagging immediately for Milne. In other words we've taken the decision for something to be implemented which certainly won't directly benefit us but which has absolutely made things a bit worse for us. Would echo this as well. Even though we don't have it in L1, it feels like the standard of officiating has been poorer since it was implemented in the Premiership. More of the top officials required to operate it meaning a talent drain further down. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rugster Posted March 18 Share Posted March 18 16 minutes ago, lanky_ffc said: Would echo this as well. Even though we don't have it in L1, it feels like the standard of officiating has been poorer since it was implemented in the Premiership. More of the top officials required to operate it meaning a talent drain further down. This is a massive part of the problem for me. Obviously like you VAR hasn't impacted on me (or rather my team) directly, but there's no doubt it has impacted indirectly on the quality of officials available for us diddies. Some of the refereeing in our league since it was introduced is just mind blowing. Since day one I've been saying they should be using retired refs for VAR, as no fitness level whatsoever is required. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Insert Amusing Pseudonym Posted March 18 Share Posted March 18 I emailed Hearts at the time, they could not have cared less. I'm not going to boycott because of it even though it its clearly awful as i genuinely don't think there is any way it comes back out now it's in. You'd need universal agreement between fans that it's bad, which you don't have, and a coherent approach to impact it. I'd love to be wrong on it but i don't think a couple of hundred emails/threats of boycott across various different teams is going to make any progress 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Melanius Mullarkey Posted March 18 Share Posted March 18 (edited) I'll probably just do something like this if that helps. Edited March 18 by Melanius Mullarkey 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Desp Posted March 18 Share Posted March 18 (edited) I've fired off an email to the Well Society to see what their view on the continued use of VAR is, and how they plan to try and entice fans to purchase a season ticket going forward if it remains as is. If the only benefit of VAR we can produce is that John Beaton gets to referee the 4th best team in Austria against the 5th best team in Greece in the Conference League each season, then that will not do I'm afraid. Fans CAN make an impact on this (we've seen it happen before) but there doesn't appear to be the appetite sadly. Which is utterly baffling as the main people affected by this nonsense are the actual match going fans. Edited March 18 by Desp 6 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Busta Nut Posted March 18 Share Posted March 18 Someone should type out a template for those too lazy, then that can be emailed off. 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KingswellsRed Posted March 18 Share Posted March 18 I still think some sort of petition which can be shared around fans of all clubs might be worth a go. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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