Premier League share announcement that could cause havoc in West Ham vs Brentford
West Ham’s clash with Brentford could descend into chaos on Monday evening.
Nuno Espirito Santo is desperate to arrest a dismal record against the Bees on 20 October and turn the Hammers’ season around.
West Ham are genuine relegation candidates at the moment, sitting 19th in the Premier League table after their first eight matches.
Their task may have been made harder after a shocking new announcement was made ahead of the London Stadium contest.
West Ham subject of Premier League reveal just minutes before kick-off
Nuno made huge changes to the West Ham starting line-up, but it was a revelation off the pitch that could have the most impact and cause havoc.
Just minutes before the contest, the Premier League Match Centre shared an announcement via their official X account, that the semi-automated offside technology would not be in use, due to Amazon’s Web Services outage.
It said: “Due to the impact of today’s global AWS outage, this evening’s match will begin without the use of Semi-Automated Offside Technology (SAOT). If required, the VAR will use virtual offside lines, as in previous seasons, to determine an offside decision. If SAOT becomes available during the game, it will be implemented when appropriate.”
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West Ham or Brentford could be impacted by new announcement
Semi-automated offside technology helps referees to determine whether a player is offside, and has seemed to make decisions faster than before it was implemented.
If it is not in use for the clash, then it could potentially negatively impact one of the teams, an official could give a player offside or onside, when it is not the case.
- SOAT was implemented in the Premier League in April 2025
- It creates a “kick point” and automatically creates offside lines, quickening up the process, the VAR referee then reviews and approves the decision
- It is used in close offside calls, with over 30 cameras installed in Premier League stadiums
It will be a huge controversy if there is an incident and it turns out that SOAT would have made a different decision.
However, unfortunately, if the technology is not working, then it is not working, and nothing can be done about that.
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