Amsterdam — World hockey has “no plans” to add additional video reviews outside the 23m line. The International Hockey Federation told THP that changing the rule would only add further stoppages to matches.
There have been several incidents during Pro League and the Women’s World Cup which would warrant video referrals for teams, or indeed umpires to check.
But the current video referral regulations don’t allow teams to refer for an incident outside of the 23m line.
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Luciano Aymar may support the view of extending video referrals beyond the 23. A Dutch goal in the 2012 London Olympic final followed a foot fault between the 23 and halfway mark of Argentine territory. It directly influenced the goal scoring move. A referral could have helped disallow the goal. Teams would risk using referrals beyond the 23 only in such cases, I expect. And if we keep it down to just one referral per team per match it could be worth experimenting
I agree that extending team referrals outside of the 23 would be a bad move. But allowing the video umpire the option to call and review foul play anywhere on the pitch would be a forward step.
There is no question is my mind that the video umpire should be able to call obviously and significant umpiring decisions including dangerous play anywhere on the pitch like rugby does. It’s the speed of the reviews that needs to be improved, also perhaps we need to go back to putting the referrals over the pa system so the crowd has an idea of what’s going on?