Irish League referee Jamie Robinson gives his verdict on sin-bin introduction as he believes more research is needed before implementation

Jamie Robinson, who has been a referee in Northern Ireland's top flight for the last seven years, believes the introduction of sin-bins could come too soon after the use of VAR at the top level in England and Scotland.

It was revealed earlier this month that a trial could commence soon where a blue card would be shown for dissent and professional fouls where the offenders would be sin binned for 10 minutes.

FIFA has since clarified the trial will not occur in elite football, while football’s lawmakers, the International Football Association Board (IFAB), will not publish plans for the sin bin trial until later this month.

Sin bins have been used in grassroots football successfully for a number of years, but the IFAB indicated at its annual business meeting in November a willingness to test them at higher levels.

It is understood that in these planned trials players would be shown blue cards for dissent and tactical fouls, such as Giorgio Chiellini’s cynical tug on Bukayo Saka for Italy against England in the Euro 2020 final.

The introduction of a blue card, if it passed into the laws of the game, would mark the biggest single change in managing player discipline since red and yellow cards came into force at the 1970 World Cup.

Robinson said: "I know this proposal has been met with resistance by some stakeholders who fear it might complicate the game even further.

"Once VAR was suggested and proposed, it was met by opposition and we now have it in operation, so we can't rule out any changes to the sport.

"But as we are still new to VAR, is it wrong to introduce another huge change so soon?

"My opinion there are certainly benefits of having this introduced but there are also potential challenges.

"There would need to be more research and trials done to actually determine if it's the best thing for the game or not.

"There's an argument that this proposal is better for the grassroots level rather than elite level."

Whilst labelling the proposal as "interesting", Robinson - who was appointed as a Fifa official at the age of 25 - outlined the pros and cons of the potential new development in the game.

"One of the potential benefits to this would be improved player behaviour and more respect to the referee given that they would have this new alternative form of punishment," he added.

"It might give the referee an alternative option of giving a red card in certain circumstances that their hands might feel tied. For example, at present, if an obvious goalscoring opportunity is denied by a shirt pull inside the box, it is a penalty and a red card because there's no clear attempt to play the ball.

"Now, the argument would be, is a penalty and a blue card more appropriate?

"That's why the change was brought in not so long ago that a yellow card was given for an attempt to play the ball in a denying goalscoring opportunity circumstance.

"One of the biggest potential problems is that there will now be a different combination of cards which will make the decision making process for a referee even more challenging than what it already is.

"It can also create a lot of confusion for players, fans, the media and anyone else involved.

"There is also an argument that it could disrupt the flow of the game, especially if you've got multiple players in the sin-bin at the same time and they are coming back on and others are going off.

"Furthermore, a challenge would be that if a team is reduced to 10 men due to a sin-bin that they may end up wasting time until they are back to 11 players, so although it may solve one problem, it potentially creates another."