The video assistant referee (VAR) due to oversee the Merseyside derby and Arsenal’s crunch clash with Manchester City has been replaced after wrongly ruling out a Brighton and Hove Albion goal this weekend.
Professional Game Match Officials Limited (PGMOL), the body responsible for match officials in English football, has confirmed that John Brooks will no longer be on duty for the two fixtures this week.
Brooks incorrectly drew offside lines when ruling on Pervis Estupinan’s apparent opener, with James Tomkins wrongly identified as the Crystal Palace defender closest to his own goal when Marc Guehi appeared to be deeper than his teammate.
PGMOL admitted on Sunday that the decision to chalk off Estupinan’s goal had been been incorrect.
Conversely, Ivan Toney’s equaliser for Brentford against Arsenal was wrongly awarded after another human error.
“PGMOL can confirm its Chief Refereeing Officer Howard Webb has contacted both Arsenal and Brighton & Hove Albion to acknowledge and explain the significant errors in the VAR process in their respective Premier League fixtures on Saturday,” the body said in a statement.
“Both incidents, which were due to human error and related to the analysis of offside situations, are being thoroughly reviewed by PGMOL.”
Andre Marriner will assume VAR duties in Brooks’ stead for Liverpool’s encounter with Everton tonight, while David Coote has been appointed to oversee the top-of-the-table clash between Arsenal and Manchester City on Wednesday.
Reports over the weekend suggested that PGMOL chief Howard Webb had called an urgent meeting of all officials on Monday morning.
Webb returned to the Premier League at the start of December from a role in Major League Soccer.
Former Premier League referee Dermot Gallagher praised PGMOL for acting decisively .
“It could be that they’ve spoken to [John Brooks] and he’s upset and doesn’t feel in the right frame of mind,” Gallagher suggested on Sky Sports News.
“It could be the fact that they want to give him time to get it out of his system - it could be for a number of reasons but I think it’s marvellous that they’ve acted fast and called a meeting.
“That’s the real plus point - they’ve acted positively and in time before the next set of fixtures so it can be rolled out and explained to the media and the clubs how they are going to deal with it and make sure they’re not in the same position on Wednesday night or Saturday afternoon.”
