Thu. Nov 21st, 2024
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John Brooks has been replaced as the VAR operator for Liverpool’s game against Everton on Monday and Arsenal’s game with Manchester City on Wednesday.

Brooks made a mistake when he was in charge of VAR for Brighton’s 1-1 draw at Crystal Palace on Saturday.

Brighton had a goal disallowed for offside after the VAR guidelines were wrongly drawn.

Andre Marriner will replace Brooks on Monday, while David Coote will assume VAR duties on Wednesday.

Howard Webb, chief of referees’ body PGMOL, has called a meeting for Premier League referees to discuss mistakes in the use of VAR this weekend.

The former World Cup final referee has already rung Arsenal and Brighton to explain errors in their games.

VAR operator Lee Mason did not draw the guidelines to check for offside on Brentford’s equaliser against Arsenal.

Ivan Toney’s 74th-minute goal was the subject of a VAR check by Mason following Ethan Pinnock’s challenge on Gunners defender Gabriel.

That incident was cleared but there was a suggestion Christian Norgaard was offside in the build-up.

However, Mason, who has moved on to dedicated VAR duties, did not use the system’s lines to check Norgaard’s position relative to Arsenal’s defenders.

In Brighton’s game at Selhurst Park, Pervis Estupinan’s strike on 32 minutes was disallowed after a VAR review deemed the Ecuadorian to be offside.

However, the offside line was wrongly drawn from James Tomkins rather than his fellow Palace defender Marc Guehi, who was stood in a deeper position and playing Estupinan onside.

Webb returned from Major League Soccer at the beginning of December vowing to improve standards in the English game.

However, a positive start has been damaged by the VAR mistakes involving Arsenal and Brighton, leading to a public acknowledgement of “human error”.

It is understood all officials, with the exception of those on European duty this week, have been asked to attend the meeting.

Webb will use the meeting to discuss the issues that lay behind the mistakes and reiterate to officials that similar mistakes cannot be made if managers and players are to retain trust in the system.

Appointments for next weekend’s fixtures are set to be confirmed on Tuesday.

What else happened?

BBC Match of the Day pundits Alan Shearer and Danny Murphy described some of the weekend’s refereeing decisions as “unfathomable” and “awful”.

Murphy said: “It is getting to a point where it is difficult to comprehend how inefficient VAR is.” Shearer added: “I don’t know what else to say apart from horrendous day for VAR. A terrible, terrible day for the officials and VAR”.

Chelsea were denied a late penalty against West Ham, despite Tomas Soucek appearing to block Conor Gallagher’s shot with his arm. Referee Craig Pawson waved play on after Gallagher’s 89th-minute shot clearly struck Soucek’s hand, with VAR making no decision on the incident.

Wolves had Mario Lemina sent off when he picked up a second booking after 27 minutes in their 2-1 win against Southampton.

Asked what referee Jarred Gillett had told him about the reason behind Lemina’s second yellow card, Wolves midfielder Ruben Neves told BBC Sport:external-link “You really want to know what he said to me?

“He told me there were two players running to him and because Mario was the third one, he gave him a yellow card.”.

Former England striker and Match of the Day presenter Gary Lineker tweeted: “The VAR process is seriously flawed. Needs a rethink. Mistakes and ludicrous delays for obvious decisions are sucking the life out of the game.”

Former Premier League referee Keith Hackett said he believes referees are “over-relying” on VAR.

“You cannot make the errors that we saw yesterday. Without VAR I think assistant referees, in those situations, would have raised the flag and given offside,” he told BBC Radio 5 Live.

“The assistant referees are in doubt because, in a sense, our referees are over-relying on VAR, and VAR itself is not delivering the accuracy.

“That is the process that’s clearly not working and it is the lack of communication with the fans that we’re all crying out for that is not being delivered.”

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