READING Football Club’s first taste of VAR in its FA Cup tie with Manchester United was not in Royals' favour on Saturday.

It resulted in an offside against United being substituted with a penalty against Reading.

Premier League Burnley also had VAR at their cup tie with Barnsley. It saved them from a possible upset by the League One club, changing a penalty against them to offside against Barnsley.

Apart from VAR, what is the other connection?

The Laws of the Game contain not just the laws but also the interpretation of those laws. As well as that, rulings about particular incidents have also been incorporated during the last few years.

In 2017 a couple of these incidents were added to the offside law, and featured in the weekend's games at Old Trafford and Turf Moor.

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Referee Stuart Attwell uses VAR before awarding Manchester United a penalty on Saturday. Picture: Martin Rickett/PA Wire.

Basically, the first one says that if a ball is played to an offside player, but that prior to him playing the ball (which would make it an offence) he or a member of his side is fouled, then a free kick is given for the foul and the offside ignored.

In the Reading game, Juan Mata was in the act of passing the ball to team mate Fred, when he was fouled by a tackle from Reading’s Omar Richards.

The ball ran loose to United’s Brazilian forward Fred, who put it in the back of the net.

Referee Stuart Attwell was about to give Fred offside when his attention was drawn by the VAR to the foul on Mata. Fred’s goal couldn’t stand as he was offside, but Instead Attwell awarded a penalty to United, which Mata promptly scored.

In the Burnley/Barnsley game, referee Simon Hooper gave a penalty against Burnley which was changed to offside after the VAR alerted him to the fact that Barnsley’s offside player was fouled after he had played the ball.

This was the second part of the 2017 offside additions to the law.

The question referees must ask is: 'What came first, the foul or the offside?'