VAR Uncertainty Meets Heisenberg Principle in Football

Video Assistant Referee (VAR) was introduced to football with the promise of fairness and clarity, yet it has increasingly become a source of controversy and frustration. Goals are disallowed by the narrowest of margins, celebrations are frozen mid-joy, and matches are reshaped by decisions measured in millimetres.

Drawing on experience as both a football commentator and a trained physicist, Petras Anaab Ali, the author, explores how VAR’s quest for absolute precision has paradoxically amplified uncertainty rather than eliminated it. Using the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle as a conceptual lens, the article argues that football has encountered a fundamental limit similar to that found in physics: the more precisely certain elements are measured, the greater the uncertainty introduced elsewhere.

In the case of VAR, ultra-fine measurements of offsides and incidents come at the cost of disrupted flow, lost momentum and ignored contextual factors that define the game’s rhythm and emotional core. Rather than rejecting technology outright, the article calls for a more nuanced understanding of VAR’s limitations. Just as physics acknowledges the boundaries of measurement, football must rethink how precision is applied, ensuring that technology serves the spirit of the game instead of undermining it.

Petras Anaab Ali (MPhil) is a staff of the Environmental Protection Authority (EPA, Ghana), a Sports Analyst & Commentator on Radio Univers and Legon Today, and an MPhil Student, University of Ghana Physics Department.

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