Continuing on that theme, this article came so close to uncovering the truth, but decided to just abandon it:
It argues that VAR is taking the buzz and the drama away, but the instinct of the author is to argue that VAR should be done away with, as opposed to pointing out the flaws of refereeing in general and acknowledging that it’s still better than getting many decisions egregiously wrong.
It did lead me to this article though, while pointing out that ex-player seem to be completely clueless about the rules: