Alan Shearer was left fuming after Liverpool’s 3-1 victory over Crystal Palace and labelled the decision to award a penalty to the Reds as ‘ridiculous’, ‘wrong’, ‘pathetic’ and ‘stupid’.
The Premier League’s all-time top goalscorer claimed the standard of officiating in the English top-flight is ‘awful’ and believes the introduction of VAR has made the performances of our referees even worse rather than benefitting them.
Jurgen Klopp’s side were leading 2-1 at Selhurst Park but were somewhat hanging onto their lead after a strong second-half performance from Patrick Viera’s side had the Reds under pressure.
That was until a superb Trent Alexander-Arnold pass put Diogo Jota through on goal, the Portugal international appeared to slice the ball out for a Palace goal kick and then collided with ‘keeper Vicente Guaita.
VAR advised referee Kevin Friend to review the on-field decision at the pitchside monitor and the official then pointed to the penalty spot adjudging that our No. 20 had been fouled.
There have been some pretty questionable refereeing performances in the Premier League this season and it’s refreshing to see a pundit show some real emotion when discussing the incident.
You can catch a clip of Shearer analysing the decision courtesy of Premier League Productions (via the Marcus Rashford (fan-created) YouTube channel) – the pundit discusses the incident at (2:25):