Dundee skipper Joe Shaughnessy reveals new technique to avoid VAR penalty calls

Dundee skipper Joe Shaughnessy admits defenders are having to work extra hard to adapt their game to avoid the eagle eye of VAR.

The Dark Blues were punished last weekend when Aaron Donnelly was adjudged to have pulled Abdallah Sima’s shirt inside the area, leading to a Rangers penalty.

Manager Tony Docherty accused the video assistant Steven Kirkland of “re-refereeing” incidents after Sima also pulled Donnelly earlier in the same incident.

And Shaughnessy admits he’s had to change the way he approaches defending set-pieces because of the impact of VAR.

“As a defender you have to be a lot more careful now, there’s no room for grabbing or holding players because you don’t get away with it,” the Irishman said.

“We are all still getting used to it.

“I am trying to mark players with a closed fist so you don’t have that, but it’s difficult because in the split second your natural reactions kick in.

“I’m going into it thinking ‘keep your fists closed’ at a corner because you’re desperate not to give the refs any sort of decision to make.

‘The game is different’

“Sometimes in the past you would have put your hand across a player, but when it’s watched back and slowed down it looks like you’re grabbing them more than you actually are.

“There are so many things now that you would have got away with in the past that get pulled up, so the game is different.

“When I first came through at Aberdeen 10 years ago you got away with much more.

“And then when I was at St Johnstone, learning from Steven Anderson, Dave Mackay and Frazer Wright that was all part of it, getting close to people and stopping them playing.

“But that’s a side to the game that is gone now, you can’t leave a bit on a striker any more.

“Before the ref might have had a word with you.

“But now, everything is being picked up and there’s a lot less of the dark arts allowed.”

‘Enjoyed the game more without VAR’

The use of VAR is coming increasingly under the spotlight with a number of disputed decisions.

Shaughnessy says the feeling isn’t that more decisions are being made correctly because of the technology.

Rather that there are still errors being made, just different ones.

The Dundee skipper added: “Decisions get made and you still don’t know what they’re going to call at times.

“At first everyone thought there wouldn’t be grey areas but that’s not been there case, there are still plenty of them.

“I probably enjoyed the game more without VAR, you didn’t get every decision right but it happened to every team and you just had to get on with it.

“The same thing is happening now anyway, so nothing much has changed.

“It’s not like now, after all this, they’re getting things right every time.”