UEFA have taken a huge step towards cementing video technology by creating the Clear Line platform, a guide anyone can use to know how and when the video assistant referee should intervene.
AS newspaper report that Clear Line is already up and running. It summarises the cases, plays, procedures and criteria that must be applied, all designed to explain the workings of a technology that stirs up so much controversy.
Roberto Rosetti, head of UEFA's referees committee, said: "The question everyone is asking is: when should the video assistant referee intervene? This is the main topic. No one knows when they should do it."
He continued: "We drew on our experience spanning around 8 years, on the various VAR cases, and on more than 100 clear clips, and we created Clear Line. It is a document in which we explain when and how the video assistant referee should intervene, and it has been prepared so that everyone can have a clear line. It is not intended for referees only, but for football. It is intended for players, coaches, fans and journalists too."
For Rosetti, the foundations of VAR had to rest on a system capable of organising everything.
Velasco Carballo, another UEFA official, broke down how this revolutionary tool works. "This is not a web page for referees, and it is not a web page designed for referees' organisations," he said.
He continued: "This is a web page created to explain our basic principles to anyone. It is the space we would like to be referred to after a Champions League match, to compare cases with the clips in the library."
He noted: "It is a web page intended for clubs, players and fans. And in some of the texts, one can find expressions that may, perhaps, be very colloquial, and not in referees' terminology, but we did that deliberately."
From the 2026-2027 season, UEFA will follow this guide to the letter. The aim is simple. VAR becomes less interventionist and more precise, focusing on serious and clear errors rather than fine and small ones.