The Premier League is tweaking the rules to keep things competitive – and VAR is staying too

By Christina Philippou, University of Portsmouth

Another Premier League season of sweat, celebration and despair came to an end on May 19 with Manchester City crowned champions once again. Then, after ten months battling against each other, the 20 teams of English football’s top flight came together on June 6 to discuss their plans for the future.

One of the most anticipated items on the agenda at the private annual general meeting in Harrogate, Yorkshire, was a vote on whether to get rid of the VAR (video assistant referee) system which has proved so controversial since it was introduced in 2019.

Wolverhampton Wanderers had called for it to go but found no supporters, so VAR is here to stay – and some would say with good reason. Introduced to reduce the number of refereeing errors, research sugggests that in this regard, VAR has been a success.

But decisions are still disputed (hence the one vote to scrap it) and sometimes take a long time, which some say is taking spontaneity and excitement out of the game.

This could be risky. Even something as popular as Premier League football has to compete against other sports for viewers, and factors which viewers find frustrating will not help its cause.

But there are commercial upsides to the use of VAR. For example, some broadcasters can use these breaks to air adverts. And while sponsors generally like to avoid controversy, issues around VAR tend to keep affected clubs in the media spotlight, creating continued exposure after matchday.

Other commercial subjects up for discussion at the AGM were new financial regulations and salary caps. While profitability and sustainability rules have not changed, some new approaches will be trialled next season.

One of these will is the introduction of a voluntary “squad cost rule”, which limits the proportion of a club’s income that it can spend on player wages to 85%.

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