There is a new twist at every World Cup - British teams, mascots, vuvuzelas and so on - and this edition's innovation is VAR, which is fitting as it is often said it was the goal Frank Lampard and England were not given against Germany in 2010 that persuaded ex-FIFA supremo Sepp Blatter that resistance to technology was futile.
Six years after that disallowed goal in South Africa, FIFA's law-making body IFAB (International Football Association Board) started a two-year global trial of VAR, with England joining the great experiment late but still with more than enough time to throw up dozens of VAR-related farces, meltdowns and outrages.
FIFA, though, has been determined to ignore the naysayers and plough on, which brings us to the decision earlier this year to declare the trials a success and commit to using the system at the World Cup this summer.
The UK’s largest electrical retailer polled 2,000 fans ahead of the tournament, with 52 per cent saying they think the changes will improve the World Cup while over a quarter thought that VAR is ‘taking away the spirit of football’.
Additional reporting by the Press Association.
