VAR

[JUAN PABLO]

I have been out all morning and am wondering if anyone watched SSN?  I ask because they usually have Dermot Gallagher on to discuss any contentious refereeing decisions that have occurred over the weekend.  He's usually quite balanced and I'm wondering what was his take on it, providing he was on.

Im not sure even he had a clue , just watched it .

[Dogtanian]

I've no idea if it was a penalty or not, to be honest I probably wouldn't have given it because even in replays I haven't seen anything to make me convinced it definitely was.  I also think if there was a serious call for it then Jack would have reacted to it as he went down.

One thing is absolutely clear to me though, that you cannot blow for and book a player for diving when they haven't even made any indication that they even felt they were fouled.

[dave shelley]

I have been out all morning and am wondering if anyone watched SSN?  I ask because they usually have Dermot Gallagher on to discuss any contentious refereeing decisions that have occurred over the weekend.  He's usually quite balanced and I'm wondering what was his take on it, providing he was on.

Im not sure even he had a clue , just watched it .

Ta.

[JUAN PABLO]

The absence of consistency is what's always been frustrating.

Would we have lost to Bournemouth if Billings had walked inside 40 minutes like he should have done? Trez deserved to be sent off, but Billings got away with 4 bookable offences.

So here we sit, with 3 points instead of 4, maybe 5 points because of gross incompetence directly impacting results. And where's VAR?

An atrocious system.

and their player pulled a Villa shirt back first half and didnt get booked and got a yellow second half so fairly he should have gone , the way he was booking Villa players .

[PeterWithesShin]

This pic seems to show he has the whistle to his mouth

[Dogtanian]

That's quite clearly him eating from a tube of Smarties in his other hand.

[KRS]

I have been out all morning and am wondering if anyone watched SSN?  I ask because they usually have Dermot Gallagher on to discuss any contentious refereeing decisions that have occurred over the weekend.  He's usually quite balanced and I'm wondering what was his take on it, providing he was on.

Gallagher started off by defending VAR because it was not consulted due to the referee playing his whistle. He then went on to say that he didn’t think it was a dive, and it was a mistake by the referee. All 3 of them agreed that the goal should not have been disallowed.

[Davkaus]

This pic seems to show he has the whistle to his mouth

Grealish already up, hadn't complained at all, and Lansbury just getting ready to pull the trigger. It's almost like Friend knew exactly what he was doing.

[PeterWithesShin]

Meanwhile Cahill is still down holding his leg from a no contact dive.

[olaftab]

The ref in the Glasgow Derby today was superb.

I thought he was awful. Kept letting dangerous tackles go unpunished.

And there you have it the dilemma of being a ref when two very reasonable fans call it like this.

[paul_e]

This pic seems to show he has the whistle to his mouth

Grealish already up, hadn't complained at all, and Lansbury just getting ready to pull the trigger. It's almost like Friend knew exactly what he was doing.

I think blowing up for a dive when the player has made a pass and the recipient is 'in his swing' is a new level of shithousery (and rules out any idea that palace players had stopped). I honestly can't think of a worse decision I've ever seen, not just because he got it wrong but because he seemed so determined to undermine the ability of VAR to dispute the decision.

[Toronto Villa]

‪If the governing bodies truly want VAR to work then let it make correct decisions irrespective of the referees whistle. Because if it’s not being used to actually give correct decisions then how is it an enhancement to the human only system we had before?‬ If it sees an infraction or if it notices the referee and assistant missed something or our case blew the whistle too early that panel should be able to tell the referee that a mistake has been. If not it literally has no use at all.

[Neil Hawkes]

This pic seems to show he has the whistle to his mouth

Grealish already up, hadn't complained at all, and Lansbury just getting ready to pull the trigger. It's almost like Friend knew exactly what he was doing.

I quite agree, that photo clearly shows he was watching Lansbury - not Grealish; Zaha has his hand in the air saying not my fault he fell and Cahill is writhing on the ground from contact with the player who had the ball - begs the question(s) how was there a simulated dive if 2 x Palace players are admitting contact & why was the whistle blown just before the ball was struck by another player? Answer - if he had allowed the ball to be struck, then it would have had to go to VAR for a review on whether the goal should stand or be disallowed; he knew exactly what he was doing.

[KRS]

‪If the governing bodies truly want VAR to work then let it make correct decisions irrespective of the referees whistle. Because if it’s not being used to actually give correct decisions then how is it an enhancement to the human only system we had before?‬ If it sees an infraction or if it notices the referee and assistant missed something or our case blew the whistle too early that panel should be able to tell the referee that a mistake has been. If not it literally has no use at all.

You quite simply can’t do that...the game would turn into an even greater farce than what it is now. Players are quite rightly brought up to play to the whistle, so any action further to a whistle is quite simply “not in play”. The Palace players could easily have argued that they stopped if the goal was awarded (even though it happened so quickly that would be impossible to confirm), so the crux of it is that referees must get their decisions correct or allow play to continue so it can be reviewed by VAR to get the right decision. It’s only when we have the likes of Friend running around the pitch like a little attention seeking Hitler making up their own rules that it all goes Pete Tong.

[dave shelley]

I have been out all morning and am wondering if anyone watched SSN?  I ask because they usually have Dermot Gallagher on to discuss any contentious refereeing decisions that have occurred over the weekend.  He's usually quite balanced and I'm wondering what was his take on it, providing he was on.

Hi Dave this is what was said.
Transcript of Source sky sports

INCIDENT: Henri Lansbury's goal is ruled out as the referee's whistle has already gone, so that Jack Grealish can be booked for simulation after going down under Gary Cahill's challenge. VAR does not give a penalty.

VERDICT: Wrong call, Grealish did not dive.

DERMOT SAYS:
 "VAR was used partly on this. You have to go backwards on it. Did the referee blow the whistle before Lansbury hit the ball? He did, there's no doubt. So there's no way the goal could be given.

"You work backwards, was it a penalty, did Gary Cahill make a foul? The VAR looks at that and says no. I think they're right, it wasn't a foul, so you default back to the referee's decision which is that Jack Grealish simulated.
Whether you like it or not, VAR could not do anything about it. It all defaulted back to Kevin Friend.

"If the whistle hadn't gone, VAR would've checked whether the goal was legal, and the referee may well have said he felt there was a simulation, so I'm going to give that.

"They can check whether it's a penalty, but they cannot check simulation. The referee made his choice there, it's not the choice I would've made but he made it.

"There's three signs if we wait. Because the referee chose to make his decision when he hit the ground, that's the only thing you can look at.

"The referee's mindset is that he's gone over too easily, that he's trying to win a penalty. I thought it wasn't a dive. I thought Cahill has made contact."

Thank you for that, I appreciate it.  Thank you to the other posters that replied also.