Willie Collum admits Mohamed Diomande should not have seen red during Rangers' recent win over Dundee United.
Nick Walsh sent off the midfielder following an altercation with Kevin Holt in the dying moments of the game at Tannadice.
Diomande motioned his hand in the direction of Holt's face after being pushed, however, no contact was made.
Don Robertson on VAR duty instructed Walsh to check the pitchside monitor, but the on-field official stuck to his guns and gave Diomande his marching orders.
Rangers won an appeal via the Scottish FA's fast-track disciplinary panel, and so Diomande saw his two-game ban for violent conduct overturned.
Now, Collum has spoken out about the decision on the latest VAR Review show with Gordon Duncan.
Collum said: "We've had lots of discussion about this incident. We've coached the match officials, and we don't think it's a red card. We agree with the viewpoint that the VAR talks about when assessing the incident with excessive force, and brutality - is the contact negligible?
"These are key phrases that I have mentioned before in this show that need to be taken into account. For example, in the Motherwell vs Kilmarnock decision for violent conduct over the festive period.
"For us here, we prefer a yellow card. The referee goes to the monitor, he's entitled to stick to his original decision. For him, there is a slap. For us though, we would prefer a yellow card for this action.
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"There is a clear action though, and there is also a clear action by the Dundee United player. Potentially, the best outcome here is a yellow card for either player for the aggressive action of both players.
"The incident doesn't have excessive force and it doesn't have brutality. The contact is negligible if any."
He continued: "You're right to mention an appeal. I want to be clear that referee operations and my team have nothing to do with the appeals process. That's between the clubs and disciplinary.
"It needs to remain for incidents like this. If you don't have an appeals system then what you're saying is, VAR is perfect. We see a scenario where this is not perfection with VAR and mistakes will happen.
"Our job is to reduce the amount of mistakes happening so that we don't have to go to an appeals process. There are a lot less appeals happening than there was before VAR in Scottish football."
Two other incidents from last month involving Rangers were also discussed on the show.
Firstly, Collum confirmed that Vaclav's Cerny's goal at Dens Park was rightly awarded, with no penalty for Clinton Nsiala's coming together with Simon Murray.
The former referee also confirmed that Kevin Clancy was right not to send off Leighton Clarkson during Rangers' recent home win over Aberdeen and that a yellow card was sufficient.
