We are already onto day three of the Fifa World Cup and one of the biggest talking points on the field so far is the vast amount of stoppage time being added on in each game.
In England’s 6-2 victory over Iran on Monday, there was a total of 27 minutes added between both halves - the biggest addition being when Iranian goalkeeper Alireza Beiranvand suffered concussion after a nasty collision of heads with his teammate.
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Across the first four games of the tournament, there have been 65 minutes added, averaging 16 minutes per game. There has been a concerted effort from Fifa to clamp down on time-wasting by closely monitoring how much time the game is stopped for injuries, substitutions, celebrations, VAR decisions or other tactics to wind the clock down.
Last week, Pierluigi Collina, Chairman of Fifa’s referees committee confirmed that fourth officials had been instructed to keep track of lost time during matches in Qatar, something which they attempted to do in Russia four years ago.
"In Russia, we tried to be more accurate in compensating for time lost during games and that's why you saw six, seven or even eight minutes added on," Collina told reporters at a pre-tournament briefing.
"Think about it: if you have three goals in a half, you'll probably lose four or five minutes in total to celebrations and the restart."
After the first handful of games at the World Cup, Collina reiterated why we are seeing so much time added.
“We want to avoid only 42, 43, 44 mins of effective game time, so the time taken by subs, penalties, celebrations, treatment or VAR will be compensated.”
With a steep rise in additional time, we have already seen an increase in late goals. Iran converted a late penalty against England with 102:30 on the clock - making it the latest goal scored on record at the World Cup excluding extra time.
In the Netherlands’ 2-0 victory over Senegal, Davy Klaasen’s strike to wrap-up the three points came after 98 minutes and 17 seconds. An injury break involving Cheikhou Kouyate contributed to 10 minutes of additional time played after official Wilton Sampaio signalled for eight.
