Ex-referee labels Liverpool penalty controversy ‘garbage’

Crystal Palace were denied a penalty despite Virgil van Dijk’s apparent pull of Marc Guehi’s arm

Virgil van Dijk was perhaps fortunate to get away with a pull back of Marc Guehi (Getty Images)

A former Premier League referee has labelled the decision not to award Crystal Palace a penalty in their defeat to Liverpool as “pure garbage”.

The hosts were denied the chance to equalise from 12 yards after referee Simon Hooper waved away appeals following an incident involving Virgil van Dijk and Marc Guehi.

Van Dijk appeared to tug at Guehi’s arm, denying the Crystal Palace defender the chance to challenge in the air having broken beyond the Dutchman into Liverpool’s six-yard box.

The intervention went unpunished by the video assistant referee (VAR), who upheld Hooper’s on-pitch call, allowing Arne Slot’s visitors to emerge as 1-0 victors.

Ex-top flight whistler Keith Hackett believes that Liverpool “clearly got away with one”.

“There was a clear and obvious penalty that should have been awarded to Crystal Palace but, somehow, the officials failed to give it,” Hackett opined in his column for The Telegraph.

“As Marc Guehi attempts to get to the ball at the back post of the Liverpool box, Virgil van Dijk blatantly pulls him back to stop any chance of him doing so. Indeed, the Liverpool defender used both hands to commit the foul as if trying to draw attention to the fact he was doing something illegal.

Simon Hooper waved away the penalty appeal (Getty Images)

“Of course, referees will miss things and, therefore, Simon Hooper is not entirely to blame despite being at fault for making the initial mistake.

“But for the VAR to not intervene was frankly pathetic. The whole point of VAR is to correct mistakes, not ignore them for sake of convenience or some other unknown reason.

“To make things worse, the Premier League then confirmed the incident had been reviewed by VAR and put out a statement, arguing “that the challenge was not sustained holding and had no impact on the play”.

“Pure garbage. Everyone can see it was, in fact, sustained holding and it did impact play – even if Guehi still had some work to do to reach the ball.”

Diogo Jota’s goal settled a contest with relatively few clearcut chances as Liverpool maintained their place at the top of the league.

Defeat continued a difficult start to the season for Crystal Palace under Oliver Glasner despite a bright end to last season, with just three points secured from their first seven games.

The Austrian manager was perplexed at the decision not to award his side a spot-kick.

Glasner said: “Why didn’t VAR give it? They thought it wasn’t a penalty. This situation isn’t a discussion for me. It’s not like handball or not. Guehi wants to go for the ball and is held by two hands, it influences his run, pulls him down.

“I don’t know why it wasn’t given - and I have read the explanation.”