THERE would have been no shortage of takers in Blackburn on Sunday for an invention that an English university graduate believes could finally end all debate about the controversial offside law.

Mark Hughes, the Blackburn Rovers manager, branded the rule “a mess” that requires immediate change after his team were the victim of a farcical offside decision at Ewood Park that gifted Liverpool a 1-0 victory and effectively ended any hopes the Lancashire club had of qualifying for the Champions League.

Hughes’s concerns were echoed by three other Barclays Premiership managers — Rafael Benítez, David Moyes and Stuart Pearce — all of whom believe the present ruling is open to such interpretation that it creates problems for referees and their assistants, but help may soon be at hand.

Video technology has long been mooted as a potential solution, but Jonathan Dunne, who this year graduated with a Masters of Engineering in Computer Science from Southampton University, claims to have developed a system that is more accurate, cheaper and faster.

Dunne found that, using radio frequency identification technology, radio tags sewn into players’ kits and inside match balls can pass position data for players and the ball via receivers placed alongside the pitch to a central server, which then determines whether an infringement has taken place and alerts the referee’s assistant.

“The system monitors the velocity of the ball, and will check for offside whenever a pass is made,” Dunne said. “It can take account of whether a player is ‘active’ or not, and a signal is sent within a fraction of a second to the referee’s assistant. There is no need for a video replay.”

Dunne has conducted a feasibility study into the system and found it is much cheaper and more accurate than satellite tracking and video content analysis technology.

“The introduction of a way of conclusively determining whether a goal is offside is inevitable,” he said. “At the same time, the flow of the game should be maintained and radio tags allow this without the stoppages that video analysis would entail.”

Dunne accepts the technology would need a lot of testing and is hoping to trial the system with Southampton University’s first XI football team.

Blackburn might also oblige.