Serie A’s refereeing department will gather in Lissone at 12.30 on a fifth matchday weekend shaped by a clear, deliberate instruction: keep the referee at the centre of the contest, maintain a high intervention threshold and reserve VAR for mistakes that are unmistakable.
The meeting, held beside the video review rooms, brings together the various parts of Italian football at a point when the new approach is being tested not only by routine decisions but by the pressure of decisive episodes. Technical director Domenico Messina and Serie A and B refereeing chief Daniele Orsato have continued their work in stadiums across the country, following matches beyond the top flight as they seek consistency throughout the system.
Orsato has been pleased with the opening weeks. Speaking after the fourth round, he said the officials had adapted well to the latest IFAB changes and were working to reduce interruptions, in line with the principles followed by FIFA and UEFA. VAR, he stressed, should step in only where there has been a clear and obvious error, while the number of penalties will depend on the fouls committed rather than on any institutional target.
That direction has been visible in the treatment of time-wasting. Coaches have broadly welcomed firmer measures against delays, with more effective playing time and players less able to remain on the ground without consequence. The intention is not merely to speed up a match, but to protect its rhythm and leave more responsibility with the person holding the whistle.
Authority on the pitch, scrutiny around it
For Orsato, the larger task is to strengthen officials’ confidence. He has argued that referees must be prepared to make decisions bravely, accept that errors can be analysed afterwards and avoid officiating in fear of getting something wrong. His early assessment was encouraging: the opening rounds had produced attractive matches and a standard capable of representing Italian football well abroad.
The UEFA philosophy has also been the reference point in Lissone. The distinction is simple: football cannot be treated as though every frame can be examined like a video game. Review officials should not search for microscopic infringements, but identify substantial failures that the match referee has missed. That principle gives greater weight to human judgement, even when video is available.
Yet the debate has not disappeared. Maurizio Sarri raised a pointed objection after the incident involving Rowe’s shirt, arguing that if VAR does not intervene in a situation of that kind, then the system itself should be removed. His complaint reflects the tension at the heart of the current discussion: there is no wish to return to a review-heavy model, but there remains room to improve how the threshold is applied, particularly in penalty-area incidents.
The numbers underline the change. Across the previous two completed seasons, on-field reviews averaged around five. So far this campaign there has been only one, involving Antonio Rapuano on 12 September. In the first three rounds of both 2024-25 and 2025-26, Serie A recorded 15 penalties; this season’s equivalent total stands at five.
The question for the championship is therefore not simply whether fewer interventions make for a better spectacle. It is how Italian football defines the decisive boundary: when contact becomes a penalty, when a referee’s original view must stand, and when VAR has seen enough to interrupt a Sunday afternoon.
