Premier League clubs vote against use of five substitutes next season

 

FILE PHOTO: Soccer Football - Premier League - Liverpool v Chelsea - Anfield, Liverpool, Britain - July 22, 2020 Chelsea's Callum Hudson-Odoi comes on as a substitute to replace Chelsea's Mason Mount, as play resumes behind closed doors following the outbreak of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) Pool via REUTERS/Paul Ellis

 

(Reuters) - English Premier League clubs voted against continuing to allow the use of five substitutes in each game next season at their annual general meeting (AGM) on Thursday.

 

Clubs were allowed to increase the number of substitutes from three per match in the 2019-20 campaign when the league restarted in June, after a three-month hiatus due to the outbreak of the novel coronavirus.

 

Teams will revert to using up to three substitutes per match in the 2020-21 campaign, with a maximum of seven substitutes on the bench, the league said https://www.premierleague.com/news/1749286 in a statement.

 

Soccer's rule-making body IFAB, in May, changed the rules governing the maximum number of substitutes, looking to help teams battling possible fixture congestion as they tried to complete the season in a short period of time.

 

The IFAB said last month that teams could continue to use up to five substitutes next season, but left it up to individual federations and leagues to decide if they wanted to adopt the rule.

 

The Premier League added that clubs had also unanimously agreed to implement global soccer governing body FIFA's guidelines on the implementation of video-assistant referees (VAR).

 

The most significant change is likely to be an increased use of pitchside monitors by the on-field referee. Under the current VAR system in England all video reviews are made at the league's VAR hub at Stockley Park.

 

VAR was a source of significant controversy in England's top-flight this season, with decisions to disallow goals for players being marginally offside coming in for especially harsh criticism.

 

There is some variation in how VAR is used in different countries, and FIFA last month took over responsibility for the system from the IFAB.

 

FIFA wants to institute a uniform approach to VAR across countries and competitions, so that the laws of the game are implemented in the same way across the world.

 

(Reporting by Simon Jennings in Bengaluru; Editing by David Holmes amd Toby Davis)

 

-- © Copyright Reuters 2020-08-07

 

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For once, the EPL  makes a sensible decision.

 

The VAR offside shenanigans brought the game into disrepute, especially on the offside law, and also on the hand-ball.  VAR also lifted the burden of decision-making from the ref on the field to the invisible ghost a hundred miles away in a tv studio.  Makes life easier for the ref on the field, but leads to the hyper-'correct' decisions in the tv studio (his eyebrow was in an offside position) which any reasonable fan can see are utter bullsh!t.

Reverting back to just 3 subs seems odd considering the circumstances. 

On 8/10/2020 at 9:19 PM, champers said:

Reverting back to just 3 subs seems odd considering the circumstances. 

I agree, but it's better for spectators I think. 

22 hours ago, RickG16 said:

I agree, but it's better for spectators I think. 

 

I think it's also better for the clubs who don't have as much depth in quality as the top teams. It's a bit unfair on the smaller clubs as they can be up against a team who can change half of the line up with substitutes of the same quality