Last updated 11:48, Wednesday, 24 September 2008

SURELY it’s time for the talking to now stop and for video evidence to be introduced into professional football after a weekend of phantom goals and bad calls.

Only television replays after it was all over showed the scale of the blunder made by assistant referee Nigel Bannister when he flagged for a goal, when it was actually yards wide, during Saturday’s game between Reading and Watford.

After conferring between the officials, and bemusement from the stands, a goal was awarded.

Watford's furious protests fell on deaf ears with referee Stuart Attwell accepting his assistant's verdict, but the whole debacle could have been avoided if football hadn’t resisted calls for video replays.

Video replays have worked brilliantly in other sports so why is the Premiership, with all its riches and pressure for officials to get it right, lagging so far behind?

One of the oldest arguments against the use of television replays is the stopping and starting of the game, but in the case of both rugby league and cricket it actually adds to the excitement and tension of matches.

During the time it takes for players and managers to argue with referees over a dodgy decision and for names to go in the notebook, the video could have been re-run and everything would have been beyond argument.

We have to accept that referees and linesmen are human and will make mistakes, so they should be given every possible aid to make their jobs as easy as possible.

And managers, who have so much to say for themselves about poor refereeing decisions leading to games and ultimately jobs being lost, should be backing the campaign.

Video technology is easy to use and gives a definitive view, so what is football waiting for?