The Hoops have been involved in their fair share of VAR controversies in recent seasons, with handball, penalty and intervention thresholds regularly sparking debate among supporters.
UEFA has now introduced Clear Line, a reference guide featuring more than 150 different scenarios covering penalties, red cards, attacking offences, factual decisions and cases of mistaken identity.
The framework has been approved by the chief refereeing officers of UEFA’s national associations and is designed to encourage greater consistency in refereeing decisions and VAR interventions across domestic and European football.
For Celtic fans, it provides something tangible to consult the next time a contentious decision dominates the post-match discussion: does the explanation given by officials actually match UEFA’s guidance?
Handball is likely to be one of the most closely scrutinised sections.
UEFA states that a deliberate movement of the arm towards the ball can warrant intervention, while an arm position which makes a defender’s body unnaturally bigger can also result in an offence being given.
However, an arm held close to the body or positioned naturally as a consequence of a player’s movement can point towards no offence being committed.
Officials are also instructed to consider factors including deflections, the distance between players and whether there is clear evidence the ball actually struck an arm.
Crucially, UEFA’s guidance says VAR should not intervene when there is doubt over whether an arm position was natural or unnatural.
That could become an important reference point the next time Celtic find themselves at the centre of a handball controversy.
UEFA has also attempted to provide greater clarity around holding and pushing incidents.
The guidance makes clear that contact by itself is not necessarily enough for an offence to be awarded, with referees instead required to consider the actual impact the contact had on the player involved.
Scottish football arguments can often become fixated on whether contact existed in the first place.
UEFA’s new instructions make it clear that the decision-making process should go considerably further than that.
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