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Hawk-Eye to make football faster, not slower

There’s an interesting article on the BBC Sport site which profiles the development of Hawk-Eye technology specifically for introduction into Premiership football.

The Premiership should be checking on the developments by the start of the season. In ideal conditions the setup should be complete before the end of the year. Under conditions set out by Fifa, the information of whether the ball crosses the goal-line or not will only be available to match officials and has to be instantaneous.

Paul Hawkins on these issues:

“There is still a long way to go yet.

We are going to be developing it and then testing it. The process of testing is to throw balls around the goalposts in different scenarios and to see if the system gets it right everytime.

A series of cameras on scaffolding are positioned around the goal. We possess hundreds of cameras and we will use different ones at different times. It will be at least a four-camera system for each goal.

…

You only get one chance at this. It’s pointless rushing it. We want to get it right and as long as we do that then it will be used. It’s as simple as that.”

And also:

“It’s not being used as it was at Wimbledon. The football system is that as soon as the ball has crossed the line the referee is told immediately.

It certainly won’t interrupt the flow of the game because one of the criteria from Fifa is that the information has to be given to the referee immediately.

So, if anything, it will speed the game up. It will certainly be quicker than the time players would spend protesting whether a goal was valid or not.”

Hey, that’s a good idea – using technology intelligently to get footballers to shut up and get on with the game.

Topics: Features, Help Football