Replays have shown that VAR and Mike Dean appeared to make a big error in awarding a penalty against Newcastle United yesterday.
The Magpies controlled the game at St James’ Park yesterday and were duly rewarded with a very late winner thanks to substitute Alexander Isak, but it could have all been very different had luck not been on their side.
VAR intervened midway through the second half to award Fulham a penalty after Kieran Trippier was adjudged to have fouled Bobby Decordova-Reid, but Aleksandar Mitrovic failed to convert from the spot having kicked the ball twice as he slipped over.
While that miss brought about delight on Tyneside, they potentially shouldn’t have been in that position to start with, as Trippier appeared to have his foot stamped on by Decordova-Reid, which almost forced the defender into clipping him.
Was this a penalty?
Yes!
No!
TIF Thoughts on Trippier’s foul…
This still image above shows just how poor of a decision it was from Mike Dean and the VAR team to instruct Robert Jones to head over to the monitor and award a spot kick as the Newcastle skipper was clearly fouled himself.
While this spot kick obviously shouldn’t have been awarded given the foul on Trippier, VAR was also on Newcastle’s side as they decided Dan Burn’s pull on Andreas Pereira was not enough for a penalty and a potential red card.
Therefore, there won’t be many complaints on Tyneside, although the same can’t be said for Fulham as Marco Silva was certainly left fuming over VAR’s decision to award a penalty for the wrong incident, as it would have likely left his side playing against 10 men.