EPL: VAR officials punished after Luis Diaz offside error against Tottenham

The two Video Assistant Referee (VAR) officials responsible for Luis Díaz’s incorrectly disallowed goal in Liverpool’s 2-1 defeat at Tottenham on Saturday have been removed from the remaining fixtures this weekend.

The body in charge of refereeing in England, PGMOL, has already admitted that Díaz had a goal incorrectly ruled out for offside after the VAR, Darren England, and assistant VAR, Dan Cook, wrongly thought the goal had been given by the on-field officials.

Diaz thought he had put the Reds in front in the 34th minute, only for the flag to go up for offside.

The VAR team wrongly thought the onfield decision was “goal”.

They quickly identified that Díaz was onside and told the onfield team “check complete” to confirm the goal.

But when referee Simon Hooper was told this, he understood the decision made by his assistant on the field as being correct – which the assistant had given as offside.

That meant that rather than the decision being changed to goal, it remained disallowed.

England was scheduled to be the fourth official for Nottingham Forest vs Brentford on Sunday, and has been replaced by Craig Pawson. Cook was due to be the assistant for Monday’s game between Fulham and Chelsea but he too has been stood down and replaced by Eddie Smart.

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