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FIFA has revealed the cause of a controversial VAR error in Switzerland's World Cup 2026 opener against Qatar in Group B.
Switzerland vs Qatar ended in a 1-1 draw at Levi's Stadium in the San Francisco Bay Area. Murat Yakin's Swiss team were left to rue their lack of urgency and inability to take chances, punished by a Miro Muheim own goal deep in second half stoppage time.
The game was quarter of an hour old when Switzerland were awarded the penalty that gave them the lead against the 2022 hosts.
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Broadcast replays appeared to indicate Switzerland midfielder Remo Freuler was offside, yet VAR didn't intervene
There was no doubt about the incident itself. Switzerland midfielder Remo Freuler was toppled in the box by Qatari goalkeeper Mahmud Abunada, giving match referee Said Martinez the easiest of decisions.
The question mark was whether Freuler had been in an offside position when the ball was diverted towards him. Broadcast replays appeared to indicate that he was, with fans and pundits alike expecting to see the goal scrubbed off on review.
Instead, the penalty decision was confirmed and the spot kick confidently converted by striker Breel Embolo to give Switzerland an early lead that held for the next 80 minutes.
What happened next caused confusion. All 1,248 players named in the 48 World Cup squads were subjected to 3D body scans to equip a more advanced version of semi-automated offside technology (SOAT).
One result is more accurate, down-the-line animated stills that illustrate the outcomes of offside reviews and are typically revealed to television viewers some moments later, even if there was never any doubt in the first place.
It was therefore bound to cause consternation when a consequential semi-automated offside decision was not given the same treatment despite being so close that it looked offside to the naked eye from the available broadcast angle.
In that situation, it's only natural to wonder why. Even if it's not assumed that something is being hidden, fans who believe they saw an offside will at least want to know where the error occurred.
Addressing the matter at half time, ITV pundit Gary Neville observed the knowledge gap and subsequent suspicions.
"Why aren't FIFA showing us when there's already such distrust for them?" asked Neville. "It's a dictatorship this: the idea that they hold this data internally and not show fans, it's absolutely ridiculous."
Refereeing analyst Christina Unkel concurred: "We thought FIFA would show us these tight calls... They usually only show [those replays] when they change a referee decision, but we have the technology. Why not use the technology they've invested in?"
'A brief technical outage'
FIFA later clarified that there was a technical error not in the decision-making process itself, but in the generation and distribution of the 3D visualisation after the fact.
"During the Qatar vs. Switzerland match in the San Francisco Bay Area, a brief technical outage prevented the onside animation graphic from being generated ahead of the penalty awarded to Switzerland in the 14th minute," FIFA posted on X.
"The issue was quickly resolved. The workflow of the VAR was not affected by this issue and followed the normal procedure in checking the on-field decision.
"The lines used by the VAR to check the position of the relevant players did not show the attacking player to be in an offside position in either of the two situations immediately before the penalty decision."
What do you think? Was this a simple technical outage or a lack of transparency? Let us know...
