Why so much STOPPAGE TIME is being ADDED on to World Cup 2022 matches? Explained

The first matches of the World Cup in Qatar are already written in history books. We have watched them, got highly entertained and paid attention to one peculiar feature. Why did we have so many minutes added to regular time? Admit it, you have definitely noticed that too. After all, an unusually large amount of stoppage time was added to each half. The England vs Iran clash even set a new record of 27 added minutes, which is 117 minutes in total. Here are the other data regarding the duration of played games at the time of writing this video script. Qatar vs Ecuador, 100 minutes and 18 seconds. Senegal vs Netherlands, 102 minutes and 49 seconds. USA vs Wales, 104 minutes and 34 seconds. The history of football has never seen such things happen. There can't be a coincidence either. With all that said, the Football Club channel decided to find out what is the matter. So, without further ado, let's get into it. The European Championships and World Cups are always considered the best platform to introduce the tests which FIFA, as football's main governing body, wishes to see implemented into the number one game. At the 2018 World Cup, we all were getting used to VAR. Earlier on, FIFA struggled with simulations, elbows in the air and players pressuring referees, also introducing new rules for a goal kick. Of course, the current World Cup could not go far without innovations. We see the tauted semi-automatic offside detection system in all its glory in the opener, when only a robot could detect an offside in that episode with Valencia's brilliant goal. There was also an extra backup referee and... a wasted time count. We told everybody not to be surprised if they see the fourth official raising the electronic board with a big number on it, 6, 7 or 8 minutes. Let's take, for example, goal celebrations, which normally takes one, one and a half minutes. Pieroligi Colina, head of the FIFA referee committee, warned the head of the tournament. In other words, FIFA is trying to increase the amount of purely active time. Why was there a need for an additional backup referee? A logical question to ask, isn't it? Now there are two match officials instead of one. So, the task of this additional referee is to track lost active time, calculating minutes and seconds wasted in between. Recommendations for a backup referee was previously summarized as... Injury? Add a minute. Substitution? Add 30 seconds. Goal? Add 1 minute. That's how it works from now on. The reserve assistant now counts the time spent on goal celebrations, all VR checks, pauses after a given penalty, substitutions, disputes after any shown card, the time players take getting sent off from the pitch, and the medical care in case of injuries. The second reserve referee literally counts the seconds after which he tells the officials how much time has passed. Penalties, corner kicks and throw-ins are not taken into account yet. But it cannot be ruled out that we will see those also calculated in the near future. For instance, let's have a closer look at the record set during the duel between England and Iran. Despite the great performance by England, one of the main characters of the whole game was the referee, Rafael Claus. The attendants couldn't figure out why this weirdo was given so much stoppage time. 27 minutes to be exact. He gave 14 minutes to the first half and 10 minutes to the second. Although in the second half instead of 10, the teams played 13 minutes 8 seconds. Add up to 14 minutes 8 seconds in the first half and get 27 minutes and 16 seconds of additional time. Two record halves in the history of the World Cup. Mamma mia! Why did Claus add 24 minutes? Believe it or not, but there are new logical explanations behind his decision. As for the first half, the main reason lies in the long medical assistance to Iran goalkeeper. Alireza Beiranband collided with his defender Maid Hosseini when he went to intercept Harry Kane's pass. Alireza was brought to consciousness for 8 minutes. Then the goalkeeper returned to the pitch, but lasted there only a few minutes. A substitution took place. As we got to the second half, no more long pauses were recorded, but short breaks were still there. The longest one revolved around medical assistance for Harry Maguire, which took about 5 minutes. The game was also stopped due to injuries to Harry Kane, Luke Shaw and Ehsan Haissafi. Probably for the 6-1 on the square table, the Brazilian referee could have been operating less strictly. At the 10th minute added to the second half, VAR had to step in. Claus was told that a penalty should be awarded against England. The review on the monitors and the final decision on the penalty along with its execution took more than 3 minutes. So, there were enough stoppages for 10 more added and 13 actually played minutes after the end of the regular time. Nevertheless, guys, get used to such generous bonuses from the referees. Lots of football action, 100-plus minute ties will become the staple at this year's World Cup. Folks, press the like button under this video if you enjoyed today's episode and subscribe to our project. The further we go, the more interesting things get. The Football Club was with you. A channel with high-quality football journalism. Take care and see you next time.