Soccer Football – Premier League – Tottenham Hotspur v Liverpool – Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, London, Britain – September 30, 2023 Tottenham Hotspur manager Ange Postecoglou celebrates after the match Action Images via Reuters/Peter Cziborra Acquire License Rights
Oct 1 (Reuters) – Tottenham Hotspur coach Ange Postecoglou said he is not a fan of video assistant referees (VAR) because the system complicates matters after his team benefited from a referee error in Saturday’s game against Liverpool.
Refereeing group Professional Game Match Officials Ltd admitted it was the wrong decision to disallow Liverpool winger Luis Diaz’s first-half goal in Tottenham’s 2-1 home win, blaming human error.
“I think I have to admit that I’ve never really been a fan of it since it was introduced,” Postecoglou, who previously coached Scottish Premiership club Celtic, told reporters after the game.
“Not for any other reason than I think, because it complicates areas of the game that I thought were pretty clear in the past, but at the same time I can understand why it was inevitable that technology came into play. We have to deal with it.” .
“The game is littered with historical refereeing decisions that were not right, but we all accepted that it was part of the game because we are dealing with people,” Postecoglou said.
“I think people are under the misconception that VAR will be error-free. I don’t think there’s any technology because so much of our game isn’t factual. It depends on interpretation, and they are still human.”
“If you set the bar that high for something, it will inevitably fail. So if people think that VAR will one day be perfect, that will never happen.”
Liverpool were beaten by an injury-time own goal from Joel Matip and were reduced to nine players due to the dismissals of midfielder Curtis Jones and winger Diogo Jota.
Liverpool coach Jurgen Klopp, whose side last suffered defeat against Spurs in 2017 and have lost to them once in their last 21 league games, said the VAR’s decision not to recognize Diaz’s goal changed the dynamics of the game.
The result moved Spurs into second place in the Premier League standings, one point behind reigning champions Manchester City, while Liverpool are a further point back in fourth place after seven games.
“Who does this help now?” said Klopp when asked about the referees’ statement. “We won’t get any points for this so it doesn’t help. Nobody expects 100% correct decisions on the pitch, but I think we all thought when VAR came into play that maybe it would make things easier…
“We score this goal. It was top, top, top, outstandingly well played. In a game where you don’t get much to feel better, you do this, this is super important information, this is how we can hurt them. This is how we can beat them, things like that.
“So it was super difficult, but the boys mastered it really well.”
Reporting by Pearl Josephine Nazare in Bengaluru; Edited by William Mallard
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