VAR is working, just don’t give anyone the credit

If Donald Trump is said to fear walking down steps, my phobia was ‘going upstairs’.

You were warned early and often on this page of a grim, unwatchable future for football; of endless delays, of challenges and appeals, of muted celebrations, and of protracted, super-slo-mo searches for ‘contact’.

And yet, a week into the World Cup, VAR has been grand. Put this down as a U-turn. Or, as the politicians prefer these days, the completion of a journey.