REFEREES’ chief Howard Webb says Michael Oliver blundered by failing to send off Mateo Kovacic during Manchester City’s title clash with Arsenal.
Oliver’s controversial call at the Emirates on Sunday came just a week after Luis Diaz’s opener for Liverpool at Tottenham was wrongly disallowed for offside following a massive VAR cock-up.
Speaking for the first time since both incidents, PGMOL boss Webb admitted his top ref Oliver messed up and the Diaz clanger had “damaged” the body’s reputation.
Oliver chose to book City midfielder Kovacic for a studs-up foul on Martin Odegaard — which was reviewed by VAR John Brooks for a possible red.
Then moments later took no action after another late Kovacic foul on Declan Rice.
Webb said: “When Michael reflects on it he’ll realise the second one should have been a yellow as well which would have seen Kovacic sent off, having been on the benefit of the first decision, which was borderline.
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“The first tackle is clearly a poor one and I am confident, if a red card had been given by Michael, it would have been a very straightforward ‘check complete’ from VAR. But he doesn’t, he issues a yellow.”
Asked by ex-England star Michael Owen if he felt Kovacic was fortunate to stay on the pitch, Webb told Sky’s Match Officials Mic’d Up show: “I do. Second yellows are something VAR is not able to get involved in but he was an extremely fortunate player to stay on field.
“The referee, one of the best in the world, Michael will no doubt review that.
“He doesn’t want to have a negative impact on the game by overreacting to something. But if he underreacts you have a negative impact on the game.”
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Webb also released more in-house audio between the game’s top officials as he battled to restore VAR’s battered image. He insists new measures are in place to prevent the shocking Diaz ‘offside’ howler from ever happening again.
Webb added: “We have to put things in place to ensure that, should we have a human error, it doesn’t have the damaging impact like that.
“One of the things this has brought into sharp focus is the need to reiterate some of those communication protocols, which are really valuable in VAR to prevent this type of thing happening. So we want the on-field referee to communicate to the VAR what the on-field decision is very clearly.”
Diaz yesterday broke his silence on VAR’s “significant human error” which robbed him of his goal, admitting: “It hit me very hard, but not only me, all my team-mates, too.
“In the middle of the game we talked about it a lot.”
Oliver and VAR that day, Darren England, had just flown back from reffing on a freelance basis in the United Arab Emirates.
Webb is promising to review the policy of allowing refs to work privately.
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