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4 months ago
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This is really good from Howard Webb.
The referees (PGMOL) chief discussing (see below) with Michael Owen the award of the penalty to Newcastle United on Saturday during the 2-2 draw with Bournemouth.
Howard Webb explaining it very well in fine detail how the match officials got it absolutely right in the end, when awarding Newcastle that spot-kick which Anthony Gordon made it 1-1 from.
Premier League official site – 20 February 2024:
‘PGMOL and the Premier League are opening up discussions between the referee and the Video Assistant Referee (VAR) for key incidents this season. In the fifth instalment of “Match Officials: Mic’d Up”, Howard Webb, chief operating officer at PGMOL, the organisation that oversees the League’s match officials, discusses incidents from the last four weeks.
Webb and Michael Owen go through the conversation between the match officials to give fans greater knowledge of how decisions are made. The officials on the pitch do not hear all the conversations from the VAR hub in Stockley Park.
Incident:
A Newcastle United free-kick is sent towards the penalty area and Fabian Schar is pulled to the ground. There are multiple factors in this offence as Schar is stood in an offside position but does not impact play until after he is fouled.
What the match officials did:
Referee Michael Salisbury does not believe the shirt pull on Schar is worthy of a penalty and the assistant referee Richard West then flags for offside.
Michael Owen:
“Right, quite a complex decision that one. My gut feeling there is that it’s offside. You’re probably going to convince me otherwise. However, what’s the law, first of all?”
Howard Webb:
“I know that people have asked the question about why offside wasn’t penalised in this situation. However, the law specifically allocates some wording around this type of situation because for an offside offence to be committed the player in the offside position has to challenge for the ball or play the ball. Just being in an offside position itself isn’t necessarily an offence.
“The law stipulates that a player who’s in an offside position who’s moving towards the ball with the intention of playing the ball at some point, is then fouled by an opponent, prior to attempting to play the ball or challenging for the ball. It’s the foul that gets penalised because that occurred before the action by the attacker that would commit the offside offence and that’s exactly what we saw here.
“In this situation, the free-kick is taken. Fabian Schar is in an offside position. We know that, there’s no doubt about that.
“He starts moving towards goal and we see Adam Smith pull his shirt. The sustained holding offence, starts outside, continues inside.
“Now, we wouldn’t in normal circumstances flag as soon as the free-kick comes in. The assistant referee waits to see where the ball goes. Another Newcastle player might come in, from an onside position and head the ball towards goal so we wait to see where does the ball go.
“Does Schar get involved in the play by challenging for the ball when it’s in that dropping zone? He doesn’t do any of those things because he doesn’t have a chance to because he’s dragged down before the ball gets there.
“That action by Smith deprives Schar of being involved in a second phase, for example. So, if Sven Botman in this case comes in from behind, if he heads the ball towards goal, the ‘keeper saves it and, when he heads it, Schar’s behind the ball, he’s allowed to stay involved in play.
“He’s not allowed to do that because, in this situation Smith drags him down. So yes, we know he’s offside, but we wouldn’t normally flag it straightaway.
“We wait to see what happens. And we shouldn’t be forced into penalising the offside offence, just because Smith drags him to the floor. We’d always wait to see what Schar does in that position and we wouldn’t normally have our hand forced in the way that Smith is asking us to do here by dragging him to the floor.”
Michael Owen:
“We can see Schar …. in an offside position as you say. He’s in an offside position and the ball is kicked.
“Now the ball ends up going basically right where he was so, all of a sudden, I’m thinking, ‘He is interfering now.’ He doesn’t start pulling… he’s kicked it before he starts pulling him, so that’s the first offence.
“And the other thing is that he wouldn’t pull him back, if he was onside, he wouldn’t be pulling him back anyway.”
Howard Webb:
“He might, he might not do. But, at this point, we don’t know what Schar’s going to do in the situation.
“We don’t know exactly who’s going to get on the end of this ball. Imagine if we flagged immediately that the free-kick was taken, if we raise the flag you’d say, ‘What are you doing? You don’t know where the ball’s going. It could go to Botman.’
“Botman’s onside. He might score. So why are you penalising Schar? Why are you stopping this play in this moment?
“We see that happen all the time in the Premier League, where officials wait to see what happens.
“Schar might just stand, he might not continue moving forward. He might not get on the end of the ball. He’s not stopping anybody from playing the ball. He’s not challenging for the ball at that moment so he’s not actually committing an offside offence, he’s just in an offside position and that happens an awful lot in the Premier League.
“A lot of goals are scored with players in offside positions. So we have to wait to see what happens.
“While we’re waiting to see, with the ball a long way away, Smith drags him down to the floor committing an offence on Schar that stops him continuing being involved in that play.
“Now, of course, if the ball goes to Schar and he challenges Adam Smith when the ball’s there that’s an offside offence. We’d penalise that, that would take precedent over any holding offence.
“If the holding offence happens as he’s challenging for the ball, we’d give offside because he’s in the motion of challenging for the ball. But, at this point, he isn’t.
“The ball’s a long way away, we don’t know where exactly it’s going to go and it could be that Botman heads the ball, Schar’s behind the header.
“He’s allowed to stay involved in that play. But of course, he’s not here, because Smith has pulled him down and stopped him continuing to be involved so, I understand philosophically why people would make that argument.
“However, the law specifically stipulates that this is not an offensive offside in this moment because he’s just in an offside position, he’s not done anything and, if a player moving towards the ball in an offside position gets dragged back or fouled.
“In this situation, the first offence is the foul because the offside offence hasn’t yet happened. He’s not done anything in that position that we could penalise as officials.”
Stats via BBC Sport:
Newcastle 2 Bournemouth 2 – Saturday 17 February 2024 3pm:
Goals:
Newcastle United:
Gordon 58 pen, Ritchie 90+2
Bournemouth:
Solanke 51, Semenyo 69
(Half-time stats in brackets)
Possession was Bournemouth 37% (37%) Newcastle 63% (63%)
Total shots were Bournemouth 12 (5) Newcastle 17 (8)
Shots on target were Bournemouth 7 (3) Newcastle 5 (2)
Corners were Bournemouth 2 (2) Newcastle 4 (1)
Referee: Michael Salisbury
Attendance: 52,224 (1,000 Bournemouth)
Newcastle team v Bournemouth:
Dubravka, Trippier, Schar, Botman, Burn (Livramento 71), Longstaff, Guimaraes, Miley (White 90+1), Almiron (Ritchie 90+1), Barnes (Murphy 67), Gordon
Unused subs:
Karius, Dummett, Lascelles, Krafth, Hall
(Newcastle 2 Bournemouth 2 – Match ratings and comments on all Newcastle United players – Read HERE)
(Andoni Iraola blames match officials after Newcastle United match – Embarrassing – Read HERE)
(Eddie Howe talks about 6 different Newcastle United players – Including new injury concern – Read HERE)
(Have you seen this Newcastle United team? Newcastle 2 Bournemouth 2 – Read HERE)
(Newcastle 2 Bournemouth 2 – Instant Newcastle United fan / writer reaction – Read HERE)
Newcastle United confirmed matches to end of March 2024:
Saturday 24 February 2024 – Arsenal v Newcastle (8pm) TNT Sports
Tuesday 27 February 2024 – Blackburn v Newcastle (7.45pm) BBC1
Saturday 2 March 2024 – Newcastle v Wolves (3pm)
Monday 11 March 2024 – Chelsea v Newcastle (8pm) Sky Sports
Saturday 16 March 2024 – Crystal Palace v Newcastle (3pm) ***If Newcastle beat Blackburn, NUFC will be playing in FA Cup sixth round this weekend instead.
Saturday 30 March 2024 – Newcastle v West Ham (12.30pm) TNT Sports

 
