Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1066826
28 maltatoday | SUNDAY • 30 DECEMBER 2018 REFEREES SPORTS WARREN ZAMMIT 2019 will be a breakthrough year for Maltese football as the MFA's refereeing committee is seriously considering introduc- ing Visually-Assisted Refereeing (VAR) technology in order to ensure fairer decision-making and guaranteeing quality ap- pointments on an international level for local officials, MaltaTo- day has learned. Kevin Azzopardi, the Malta Football Association's director of referees, told this newspaper that the refereeing department was currently evaluating the effects the introduction would have on the local game and officials. VAR is a relatively new concept that is becoming quite popular on an international level. Coun- tries such as Spain, Italy and Germany already invested in this technology that has the aim of reducing mistakes made by game officials. The technology is also on its way in England as well as the UEFA Champions League. Many commentators had summarily dismissed the pos- sibility of introducing VAR in Malta, but Azzopardi insisted that 2019 will herald in some changes. As for 2018, Azzopardi praised a number of initiatives, includ- ing the organisation of the UEFA winter course for top international referees which was hosted in Malta, a seminar for elite referees in Germany, the relaunch of exchanges with countries such as Wales and San Marino as well as the con- solidation of international ap- pointments for FIFA referees. But Azzopardi acknowledged that losing a top referee such as Clayton Pisani was terrible. Nonetheless, the committee needed to move on and thus Matthew Degabriele was ap- pointed on the FIFA panel. Azzopardi said he was also sat- isfied that Malta had managed to retain four referees on the FIFA panel and succeeded in guaranteeing the return of Clin- ton Cassar as an international referee for Futsal. He also attacked what he de- scribed as "unfair and non-con- structive criticism in the media" and praised the referees for ris- ing to the occasion. Asked to comment about the case of elite referee and FIFA Beach Soccer referee Jude Ad- min Utulu – who was dismissed following allegations of serving as an agent to bring Nigerian players to Malta – Azzopardi admitted this had left a "sour taste". "When a referee is accused of such wrongdoing, it is never nice to talk about it," he said, while refusing to comment fur- ther as the case had entered the appeal stage. A referee who used to be in the limelight frequently due to a number of controversial deci- sions was Sandro Spiteri. Dur- ing this season, Spiteri was not seen officiating in the Premier League and Azzopardi con- firmed that he (Spiteri) can now only act as fourth official since – after analysing last season's grading – the referees' commit- tee had decided to demote him from an elite referee to an elite development referee. There were a number of other allegations regarding an ex- FIFA referee who had been ac- cused of failing to report an al- leged bribery attempt related to the 2016 FA Trophy final. MaltaToday is informed that the referee investigated is Mar- co Borg. Azzopardi confirmed this and said the case had been investigated by the MFA's In- tegrity Officer and the conclu- sions will be made public in the near future. As to whether teams would be informed of the selection of ref- erees ahead of games, Azzopar- di said this was going to happen. In fact, he insisted, "it is a matter of when, not if". Azzopardi also discussed the challenges that the referee com- mittee faces when it comes to recruiting referees. As a UEFA study showed, the most challenging part was re- taining those referees, with the retention rate across Europe be- ing a meagre 10%. "In this context, the aim is to keep referees motivated and willing to learn," Azzopardi said. MFA referees' committee mulling possibility of introducing VAR Kevin Azzopardi VAR was used extensively during the 2018 World Cup in Russia