Nothing infuriates more than the entire 90 minutes of a football game being ultimately decided by a questionable referee’s decision.
The decision to give Brighton a penalty for what was clearly an accidental clash of heads, was the decisive moment for Arsenal. I immediately felt the officials had got it wrong.
Then I thought again. Consider if William Saliba was going for the ball with his foot, missed the ball and accidentally kicked Joao Pedro, that would clearly be considered a penalty. So, why should it be any different because it was his head that made contact while trying to win the ball and failing? On top of this, they had the VARs recheck it and they agreed too. The officials had decided the outcome, but this time in a good way.
Except they didn’t. Maybe they rushed through the angles back at Stockley Park, because the video assistant referees were regularly hammered for being too slow last season. Shortly afterwards, an angle was discovered that showed Saliba’s head had got the slightest glance on the ball. Quite simply, smoking gun evidence that it should not be a penalty. Who is to blame for this error?
The blame at least in part lies with the fans, pundits, media, players and indeed managers for complaining about how long VAR took to get the decisions right last season.
We have to make up our minds.
Do we want to wait and ensure the big decisions are correct or do we accept incorrect rushed decisions like this that will decide games and maybe even the destination of the Premier League title?
Sign up to read more from Pat Nevin in his Football Extra newsletter