Newcastle, Man United & Liverpool set to be impacted by ‘controversial’ Premier League decision

The majority of top flight clubs have decided against introducing the new system for the upcoming Premier League season, according to The Times. The system uses limb-tracking technology and artificial intelligence to determine whether a player is offside and has received positive feedback from UEFA and FIFA following its use in European club competitions and the World Cup in Qatar.

This means Premier League offside decisions in 2023-24 will continue to be made by referee’s assistants on the touchline with VAR interfering in contentious calls. But the process has been criticised due to it’s potentially prolonged nature and risk of human error as lines are manually inserted by VAR officials in an attempt to determine whether a player was in an offside position.

This led to some controversial offside calls during the 2022-23 campaign.

The automated technology is said to be considerably quicker and more accurate than the Premier League’s current system. While it will be able to determine whether a player is in an offside position, the interpretive nature of the rules surrounding a player ‘interfering with play’ still require human input, making it ‘semi-automated’ in practice.

While it will not be in place for the upcoming Premier League campaign, the system could still be introduced for the 2024-25 season with less than half of clubs currently having the infrastructure in place.

European regulars Manchester City, Liverpool, Chelsea, Tottenham Hotspur, Arsenal and Manchester United already have the infrastructure in place for an automated offside along with Brighton & Hove Albion and Nottingham Forest. Newcastle United will also have it for next season as they prepare for Champions League football.