VAR made World Cup history in a big way, leaving fans puzzled during the USA’s win over Paraguay.
World Cup fans were a bit puzzled by a moment during the USA’s first match against Paraguay – but there’s a simple explanation.
On Saturday, June 13, Mauricio Pochettino’s team kicked off their tournament with a bang. Just seven minutes in, Paraguay’s Damian Bobadilla accidentally scored an own goal, giving the USA an early lead in their Group D game.
Former Arsenal player Folarin Balogun added more excitement by scoring twice – once at 31 minutes and again just before halftime. This made him only the second American ever to score two goals in a World Cup game.
Paraguay pulled one back with 17 minutes left, but Giovanni Reyna sealed the win by scoring in stoppage time, making it 4-1. Fans in the stadium went home very happy.
This win was one of the USA’s biggest ever at a World Cup, matching their 3-0 wins over Belgium and Paraguay back in 1930, when they finished third overall.
Even though the team played really well, many fans online focused on a confusing referee moment during the match.
Here’s what happened: When the score was 3-0, former Fulham defender Tim Ream was given a free-kick and a yellow card by referee Danny Makkelie. But after the free-kick was taken, the referee stopped the game and checked the VAR monitor. He then cancelled the yellow card for Ream and instead gave a yellow to Paraguay’s Miguel Amorim for diving.
This was the first time in the tournament that a referee fixed a “mistaken identity” call like this, which means giving a card to the wrong player. Before the tournament, referees couldn’t change yellow card decisions like that, but now they can. They can do the same with red cards too.
Fans had mixed reactions to this new rule. One said, “WHAT IS A VAR CHECK FOR MISTAKEN IDENTITY????” Another thought the name wasn’t quite right, saying, “They need a better name than ‘mistaken identity.’”
Some fans liked the change: “The new rule lets VAR fix situations where the referee picks the wrong player for a card. Before, mistakes sometimes stood if play restarted. This is needed in the Premier League too!”
Others felt it slowed the game down too much: “Why does the ref need to watch the monitor? VAR should just decide and keep the game moving. Common sense is missing here.”
And some were happy to see VAR used properly: “Finally, VAR is stopping players from cheating and diving. This should cut down on bad behavior.”
Next up, the USA will play Australia on June 19.