The Liverpool FC club has officially requested the publication of the audio recordings of the communication between the referee and the video assistants from the most controversial moment of Saturday’s match at Tottenham.
The referees here in the 34th minute of the first half did not recognize the goal scored by Liverpool forward Luis Diaz due to an alleged offside. It could have been an important moment for the development of the game, because the visitors were already playing at ten after Jones was sent off. And they could take the lead.
The men at the video, Darren England and Dan Cook, checked the situation, but their review was unusually short. Within a few seconds, when the familiar graphic element, the offside line, did not even appear on the screen, the check was completed and the match continued with a goalless score.
This moment is now hotly debated as the biggest failure since the introduction of VAR, a system that was primarily meant to correct human error.
“Human error” is also referred to in a statement by the body that acts as the Referees’ Commission in England. He already issued a statement on Sunday, from which it follows that the VAR service failed, not the technique.
Liverpool are not content with this statement and are moving on. He wants to get access to the recording of the communication between the referees and the VAR to show why he was fatally injured on Saturday.
The static images from the cameras from the mentioned moment show fairly convincingly that Luis Diaz was not offside and the goal should have stood.
Both actors have been suspended since the video.
Jamie Caragher, the Liverpool legend, told the Sky Sport TV football show that VAR has reached a tipping point. “I can imagine that Howard Webb (head of referees – ed.) and the committee feel terrible now, but I feel like it’s reached a crisis point for the whole of VAR in this country,” Caragher said.
Liverpool lost the match 2-1 and Saturday could have looked like the perfect “conspiracy” from their fans’ point of view. Other factors were added to the situation from the 34th minute: two expulsions in the match, in addition to Matip’s own goal in the last seconds of the second half. All this resulted in Tottenham taking all the points and Liverpool leaving empty-handed.
