Norway on verge of abolishing VAR from domestic leagues after club vote

Norway is on the verge of abolishing VAR from its domestic league after clubs in the country’s top two divisions formally recommended that it should be discontinued.

The decision by clubs in Norsk Topfotball, which represents the 32 sides in Norway’s Eliteserien and first division, marks the most significant step yet in a fierce debate over VAR’s future in the country. Now Norway is one step from joining Sweden, which has resisted introducing the deeply controversial technology so far, in staging games without its intervention.

Norsk Topfotball’s clubs passed a motion that “requests that the Norwegian Football Federation (NFF) board recommend, and that the federal assembly adopts, the discontinuation of video-assisted refereeing as soon as possible”. Their verdict will now be handed to the NFF ahead of a meeting in the first week of March that will see every club in Norway, including those at much lower levels, take a final vote on the future of VAR.

Cato Haug, the chairman of Norsk Topfotball, explained clubs had agreed that VAR, whose implementation has caused a strong backlash among fans, is unworkable in its current form. “We see the technology has potential,” he said. “But through today’s discussion and subsequent voting, we see the majority of our clubs believe the current version of VAR does not work well enough.”

The decision to recommend that VAR is scrapped was reached after votes by club members to that effect. Clubs are member-run in Norway and each held a meeting in which the subject was tabled.

Nineteen of the 32 voted to remove VAR, with the explicit expectation that Norsk Topfotball would go along with that outcome at its board meeting on Wednesday. There had been concerns that democracy may not be upheld, with insiders at a number of clubs known to favour keeping VAR, but they have honoured their supporters’ wishes.

Now the NFF, which has been in favour of retaining VAR, must decide its stance ahead of the vote in March. A statement from Norsk Supporterallianse urged it to hear the clubs’ voices. “The top clubs’ conclusion must be decisive for the federation board,” it read. “It is [their] teams that have to play with VAR (or risk having to do so), and it is they who have to pay much of the price. It would be strange if the federation board recommends that the grassroots clubs, who are blessedly far from VAR, impose a system on the elite league clubs that they do not want.”

A stronger motion tabled by nine of the clubs whose members had voted against VAR, including the country’s most successful club Rosenborg, that it is not used in the forthcoming 2025 season failed to pass. It means a potential stumbling block, even if their will is carried through in March, may yet be how the wording “as soon as possible” is interpreted. One consideration could be that the current domestic television rights cycle runs until 2028; a change may be thought difficult before then.

Protests against VAR have been common in Norway since it was introduced two years ago, with one high-profile occurrence seeing a match between Rosenborg and Lillestrøm abandoned in July after fish cakes and smoke bombs were thrown onto the pitch.