International Football Federation (FIFA) officially on Monday, 29 April 2024 has recognized and approved the use of Video Assistant Referee (VAR) technology in the Malaysian League starting the 2024/25 season.
This FIFA recognition is certainly a source of pride for the country because Malaysia is one of the 68 countries that FIFA has approved for the use of VAR technology.
The FIFA delegation that came to this country last April, namely Bhaveshan Morghan and FIFA’s VAR instructor, Igor Rodajcic, conducted an evaluation and test process on the level of referees’ skills and the effectiveness of VAR technology.
During the six-day VAR seminar, a total of six trial matches were conducted by the Football Association of Malaysia (FAM) and the Malaysian Football League (MFL) for that purpose.
The MFL has also prepared a total of eight pre-season matches involving Super League teams. It gives referees the opportunity to continue to familiarize themselves with VAR technology before facing the 2024/25 Super League season.
Bhaveshan, through his report, praised the level of preparation and the skill level of VAR referees in this country, thus leading to FIFA’s approval for the use of VAR technology in the 2024/25 Malaysia League competition which will start on May 10.
Looking back at the beginning of VAR in this country, FAM President, Datuk Haji Hamidin Haji Mohd Amin in February 2023 sparked the idea and initiative to introduce VAR in the Malaysian League starting from the 2024/25 season and it has received strong support from the FAM Executive Committee and the top leadership of the MFL .
Datuk Haji Hamidin then met the Chairman of the FIFA Referees Committee, Pierluigi Collina when he attended the 73rd FIFA Congress in Kigali, Rwanda on 16 March 2023 to discuss in more detail matters involving VAR technology.
The implementation of VAR in Malaysia was started in April 2023 with the visit of a delegation from FIFA to give a briefing on the VAR protocol and its implementation procedure.
Next, FAM has started VAR referee training which starts from June 2023 to April 2024 by going through three phases of training.
As a result, FIFA has commissioned a total of 22 Referees as VAR referees, 20 Assistant Referees as AVAR and nine Referees as Replay Operators.
FAM also trained a total of 17 Assistant Referees to understand the VAR protocol and will be appointed as Assistant Referees 1 and 2.
As a long-term measure, FAM will continue the process of teaching and learning VAR skills.
FAM will also conduct a post-mortem match (post match review) as a step to strengthen and refine VAR education.
FAM will also start the second phase of VAR training to further increase the number of VAR referees. This effort will be started in the near future.
This proves that Datuk Haji Hamidin and FAM are very committed in trying to further improve the performance of football referees in this country.
In conclusion, the implementation of VAR in the Malaysian League is expected to open up more opportunities for our referees to be selected to work at the AFC and FIFA levels.
The use of VAR in the Malaysian League is also expected to be able to improve the quality of football in the country in general.
Credit Photo : Sri Pahang FC
