Pgmol releases VAR audio from United’s contentious goal vs Fulham that was disallowed.
The PGMOL have released VAR footage from the decision to disallow Manchester United midfielder Scott McTominay’s goal against Fulham earlier this month.
United visited Craven Cottage on November 4 and thought they had made the perfect start when taking the lead in the eighth minute.
Christian Eriksen floated a free-kick into the back post and Alejandro Garnacho played the ball back across the box, where McTominay was waiting to find the net with a simple finish.
McTominay began to celebrate and the referee’s initial on-field decision was goal, but VAR officials reviewed the move and subsequently disallowed it because Harry Maguire was interfering with play from an offside position.
The decision was controversial because Maguire, who was being marked by Fulham defender Tim Ream, was not in the immediate vicinity of Garnacho, but VAR footage has been released to clarify what happened.
The VAR officials decided Maguire was ‘attempting to play with impact’ from an offside position and that’s why it was disallowed, although it was described as a ‘subjective decision’ because he didn’t touch the ball.
Sky Sports broadcast the footage on Tuesday night and PGMOL boss Howard Webb said: “Just being in an offside position in itself isn’t an offence, it depends what you do in that position.
“If you touch the ball, that is factual and the referee does not have to go to the screen when that happens. But you can also interfere with play without touching the ball and that needs a judgment by the match officials.
“What we see Harry Maguire do is attempt to play the ball, challenge the opposing player and impact his ability to play the ball. But it needs a judgement so the VAR will ask the referee to go to the screen to make that subjective judgement.”
