Mo Salah has 13 Premier League goals this season, but if it wasn’t for VAR, he’d have an extra three and would be clear in the Golden Boot race on 16.
In our early win over Sheffield United, the Egyptian finished beautifully in front of an empty Kop, but was ruled slightly offside after a VAR check. This one we can deal with, in fairness, as you can see he was ever so slightly beyond the last defender.
But the next one, against Brighton away in the now infamous 1-1 draw, is one that really infuriates us. There is no clear evidence of Salah being offside – and it took about five minutes of line drawing to establish as much – and even then we didn’t understand it.
Last night, he had another splendid effort cancelled out because Martin Atkinson doesn’t know the rules.
He ruled out Salah’s goal because of an accidental Firmino handball on the halfway line, way before the goal went in – which is frankly in opposition to the laws of the game.
Luckily we still won two of these games, but the Brighton draw could prove crucial at the end of the season.
Watch incident at 2 minutes in:
Watch incident at 0:37 in:
Watch incident at 0:55 in: