The Premier League has voted in favour of the implementation of goal-line technology for next season’s matches of the Barclays Premier League. The English Football Association (FA) has awarded the contract to Hawk-Eye to provide the technology, whose past experience include providing the technology in professional tennis matches.
The Barclays Premier League will also be the first domestic league in the world to implement goal-line technology, a technology that has as many for as there are against. As football competitions get more lucrative, and literally millions of dollars on the line, it looks like the scientific approach has gained the upper hand in England.
The use of goal line technology will end future debates on whether the ball crossed the line or not, such as the “phantom goal” scored by Liverpool’s Luis Garcia in the 2005 Champions League.
Image credit: Twitter(@LFC)
The Hawk-Eye technology will see seven cameras placed around the stadium, and naturally will be focused at both goals. This system has proven to better the FIFA margin-of-error requirement of +- 3cm. In the event when the officials cannot conclusively confirm if the ball has fully crossed the goal line, the system will relay the outcome to a new watch co-developed by Hawk Eye and Adeunis, within a second of the event occuring. In addition, video replays of the incident will be made available within 10 seconds after it has occurred. The high speed cameras are also capable of removing players from the image, ensuring that the ball is fully visible. Finally, the system will also work in any weather deemed playable by the referee.
While the Premier League will be the first domestic league to use goal-line technology from 2013-2014, FIFA have also been toying with implementing the technology, with the most recent round on testing being the 2012 Club World Cup tournament.
(Source: BBC Sport; additional info: Premierleague.com)
