March 3 – After months of contention, Norwegian football has voted to retain the use of VAR at the elite level following the federation’s congress on Saturday.
The Norwegian Football Federation’s general assembly passed the motion to keep the technology with 321 votes in favour of keeping the technology and 129 against.
The outcome represented a victory for the NFF and Lise Klaveness, who backed VAR after protests at Eliteserien games, Norway’s elite division. Those protests included throwing tennis balls and fishcakes on to the pitch.
The grassroots clubs which don’t use VAR swung the vote following the recommendation of the federation. In January, Norway’s top-flight clubs voted to scrap VAR, which the NFF introduced two years ago. However, that same month, the NFF board recommended to keep VAR.
Critics have argued that this was a power play by Klaveness, who is standing for a seat for UEFA’s executive committee at the confederation’s congress in April. At the January board meeting, she read out a letter from UEFA highlighting the importance of VAR.
Neighbouring Sweden has rejected the use of VAR.
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