Scottish football’s VAR era will began when St Johnstone face Hibs on October 21.
The Perth side’s trip to Easter Road will be the first Premiership game to be officiated using VAR technology after work to ready all 12 top flight grounds was completed ahead of schedule.
As well as Premiership matches, VAR will also be used for all Scottish Cup and Premier Sports Cup semi-final and final matches played at Hampden.
But all eyes will initially be on Easter Road when Saints head for the capital in nine days’ time.
VAR could be employed for incidents involving: straight red cards; penalty area incidents; goals and cases of mistaken identity.
Crawford Allan, the Scottish FA’s head of referee operations said: “We are delighted to have received approval to introduce VAR in Scottish football. We have worked extensively over a near three-year period to get to this point, have tested in every cinch Premiership stadium as part of the training process, and we are ready to go.
“As we have seen across the world, VAR has helped ensure a higher percentage of on-field refereeing decisions are accurate and that is a principle our match officials support.”
‘Ahead of schedule’
Calum Beattie, SPFL chief operating officer, added: “When 41 out of 42 clubs voted at our general meeting in April to introduce VAR into the cinch Premiership, we said that the technology would be introduced after the World Cup.
“Our clubs made clear that they wished for VAR to be introduced as soon as possible and the Scottish FA deserve real credit for being able to make this announcement ahead of schedule.
“VAR exists to increase the accuracy of refereeing decision-making and while the experience of other leagues demonstrates that implementation will not be straightforward, we are all committed to assisting the Scottish FA to help it bed in as quickly as possible over the next few months.”
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