Two Spaniards propose to FIFA the VAR of the future

The VAR continues to speak and not only because of what happens inside the field. Once the implantation phase is over in almost all the major competitions in the world, It is time to continue evolving and improving the tool. That has done Antonio Ibáñez de Alba, what negotiates, together with his partner Miguel Ángel Galán, with FIFA to implement inventions that he has made and that have been patented since November under the name of 'Control of refereeing decisions for sports use' and 'Intelligent help device for referees'.

Before getting to know these innovations in depth we must remember the conflict over the authorship of the VAR that is in court. At present FIFA is the owner of such technology, but there are several people who are fighting to win the invention. Two of them are the aforementioned partners, who joined just over a month ago. Miguel Ángel Galán has the industrial property of the brand recognized by the EU, while Antonio Ibáñez de Alba claims to be the intellectual owner of said tool after registering it in 1995 and denounce Mario Conde for appropriating said patent. In this conflict we must not forget that there is also Francisco López. which, as he demonstrated in 2017 in AS, registered the invention in 1999 under the name 'Football of the XXI Century' and is the only one that has taken FIFA, UEFA and RFEF to court for considering that they have taken away his invention.

In the defense of De Alba and Galán for their authorship of the VAR, they started a conversation with FIFA, as has been confirmed by AS. In the letter that both parties have exchanged in the last month, are the new ideas of De Alba, inventor, to improve VAR technology and assist in arbitration decisions. The information on its improvements to the tool has been in the hands of FIFA for a couple of weeks, and they are studying it.

One of the De Alba innovations that FIFA is studying are some triangulation units located under the lawn. With this it will be achieved locate the players and the ball in real time. I also know will detect the out of band With a segment that lights up blue so that the service is made through the correct zone, this segment will change to red if the player resumes the game from the wrong zone. The same will happen for detect if the ball has gone over the end lineor (would glow bright blue). It would also serve to detect phantom goals: If a ball hits one of the three sticks, but does not go over the goal line, said post will light up blue; in case if the color enters, the goal will illuminate an intense red. The illumination of the wing segments would also serve to detect offside.: if there is an illegal position, they would turn red, as well as the baseline and, on the other hand, the goal would not light up.

The future of such conversations and the type of outcome it has can be vital to the use of VAR. Not because of its improvement, but because Galán and De Alba assured when they were associated that if FIFA and UEFA did not recognize them as the 'owners' of the VAR, they would go to court and request as a precautionary measure the prohibition of the use of the VAR in the face of what they consider to be improper use of the brand and the patent. In the end, the VAR protocol is going to seem simpler than the intrigue and conflict of its authorship.

FIFA is already working on improving the offside of the VAR

In recent years, FIFA has asked companies that provide such technology to refine the tool. In addition to creating a more minimalist VAR, and therefore low cost, to which less powerful competitions and with less purchasing power have access, they have also created a semi-automatic offside. With such software, it would be avoided that the VAR referees themselves, with the help of the operators, would draw the lines to detect whether or not there is offside.