11 Oct 2022 20:02:01
What's all this about Arsenal's first goal being offside but the VAR camera not being ready so couldn't check it? If that's true that's a total disgrace and heads should roll.

1.) 11 Oct 2022
11 Oct 2022 21:38:32
VAR is not the decider, the on-field referee is. That's the argument they will use.

2.) 11 Oct 2022
11 Oct 2022 22:24:41
It wasn't definitely offside but it was never checked by VAR because the camera's they use couldn't see him.

3.) 11 Oct 2022
11 Oct 2022 22:21:59
Either way WarMachine we lost the game mate. All clubs in top flight are getting there kicks out of the fact we are having a rubbish season. Let them crack on with it it’s actually quite funny tbh ?.

4.) 11 Oct 2022
11 Oct 2022 22:33:22
I agree they got the decisions that day but when ya down on ya luck these fine margins go the other way sadly need to improve quickly.

5.) 11 Oct 2022
11 Oct 2022 22:59:06
The stupid thing is, they say they went with the decision of the linesman because they couldn’t use the technology. But, aren’t the current rules that the liner is meant to keep his flag to let the play unfold? Basically it wasn’t really a decision, he was just doing as he’s been told. On reflection, bang average performance at best, injuries to two or three key players and every major decision going in the opposition’s favour. Should do the fragile confidence the world of good. Any top sports psychologists or faith healers knocking about.

Cheers.

6.) 12 Oct 2022
12 Oct 2022 04:40:29
when we saw the first replay we thought 'oyup back leg is offside'. But then they never went back to it and they never showed the lines so naively just assumed that there was another angle that was a lot more clearly onside or they gave benefit. Turns out they couldn't even look at it.

I mean c'mon man. At this rate, you couldn't even purposely make VAR worse than it is lol.

7.) 12 Oct 2022
12 Oct 2022 07:28:22
I'm just amazed more hasn't been made of this - its shocking. So good defending after 60 seconds is bad defending and a goal to them at their home ground getting the crowd going and destroying our confidence. Of course the idiots on Sky won't mention it. Just like the penalty shout where I'm sure Neville does his usual 'i think he's in trouble here' and then its not given and they don't even mention it again. His arm was in the air, it's a stonewall penalty. And Martinelli's tackle on Trent - I mean no one has even mentioned that one - why wasn't it a sending off - he's studded his ankle and nothing. We played well in the first half and should have been 1 or 2 up on the play - would have made a massive difference. I don't like Klopp's excuses and disagree that it's 'fact' that Arenal's shouldn't have been a penalty but he is 100% right about the rest of it.

{Ed025's Note - but you cant have it both ways war machine. the tackle on trent was nowhere near as bad as the one on onana by VVD in the derby mate yet that hardly got a mention on here. mistakes happen...but you cant have your cake and eat it..

8.) 12 Oct 2022
12 Oct 2022 07:39:56
2 wrongs don't make a right Ed025. I;m not going to go through history of football looking for cakes to point out. Trent was having a mare but Martinelli mistimed a tackle, studded his ankle with force injuring him for weeks and nothing has been said about it - shocking.

{Ed025's Note - im just saying that supporters see what they want to see war machine. the dive by jesus (he was clipped but the reaction was over the top) was really no worse than what salah done for a good while (and mane to a certain extent) and i should know having watched the likes of richarlison and gordon mate..

9.) 12 Oct 2022
12 Oct 2022 08:12:37
Agreed, Saka was diving too. Diaz doesn’t dive but is very weak in the challenge. Salah doesn’t have the ball enough these days to think about diving,

{Ed025's Note - its an epidemic war machine that is ruining the game. i find it embarrassing actually mate..

10.) 12 Oct 2022
12 Oct 2022 08:19:55
Agreed ed025. My old man won’t watch football anymore because of it.

11.) 12 Oct 2022
12 Oct 2022 09:13:44
Ed25 I thought it was an ordinary cross with a bit of follow thru which is normal when crossing a ball. Sheer accident in my eyes.

Regarding the first goal, I initially thought it was offside and was surprised it was given. With that and a handball somehow not given it seems we did get a few very rough decisions but it still doesn't take away from a pretty at times shambolic performance.

{Ed025's Note - that’s very fair comment Irish. I don’t think you got the rub of the green but probably got what your play deserved mate..

12.) 12 Oct 2022
12 Oct 2022 09:31:41
I think the most important point in this thread has now got lost as it's descended into what I believe they call whataboutery. Forget whether van Dijk fouled somebody in a match one month ago or whether it was a foul on Jesus or whether Liverpool should have had a penalty for handball. These are all still subjective decisions and that is the fundamental flaw with VAR when it is used for anything other than line decisions.

What's a real worry is that we now appear to have a case of a straight-forward line decision (no opinion, interpretation or subjectivity) that the VAR system has failed on. What appears to be an offside has been missed because the system didn't have the required camera angles. A goal has been scored as a result of the VAR system failure. Forget all the never-ending debate about the VAR interpretation of the guidelines and what constitutes a foul or hand-ball; this incident is a new low for VAR in my opinion.

I'm with you WarMachine - I'm very surprised that there isn't much more of a stink being kicked up around this incident. VAR isn't fit for purpose.

13.) 12 Oct 2022
12 Oct 2022 10:12:08
I’m not buying any of this “it’s VAR” or “it’s the ref” stuff. It’s detracting from the actual fact that we were poor and got exactly what our performance deserved.

Arsenal played through us like we had no midfield, our defence was over exposed again and we handed them the game on platter. We should be looking at putting those issues right.

14.) 12 Oct 2022
12 Oct 2022 10:38:00
To be honest, I did not even see the whole offside stuff on the first goal. Looked like a perfectly good goal to me. As for the Gabriel handball, that is a stone wall penalty to me. I mean, what's his arm doing that high up and away from his body?

As for the Jesus pen? I'll reserve judgment to when that happens to Salah or any of our forwards in the box and he goes down on minimal contact and see what the officials do then.

That said, we did not deserve anything from that game in terms of our play so for me, it's all if's and but's.

15.) 12 Oct 2022
12 Oct 2022 11:12:13
But forget the specific match and result and whether our performance deserved it or not or whether you saw it or not, is there not a more general and fundamental problem here? We now know that it's possible for VAR to fail on a straight-forward binary line decision because of a limitation with the technology. It might be a very rare and unusual occurrence but I would argue that this fails the test of being fit for purpose.

{Ed014's Note - the fact it’s manned by other refs makes it unfit for purpose for me!

16.) 12 Oct 2022
12 Oct 2022 11:26:49
there are two things I think I hate most in football discussions and it’s over reactions either way and the 'but what about when…' responses to ref decisions.

The ref decisions impact all teams and going down the 'what about when' path to me is just giving the refs a pass. We may as well just give up and stop talking about it. Cos raising a bad ref call against your team doesn’t also mean that you are saying it’s always against us.

Unless that is really what you are saying haha but I think for the majority it's just pointing out the bleeding obvious and on first inspection, Saka looked offside. I wouldn’t have minded so much if they gave it benefit because of how they give more margin now. But to hear that it was just something they couldn’t look at due to a black hole in the technology is just another self-inflicted wound to an already damaged system. In the prem at least anyways.

17.) 12 Oct 2022
12 Oct 2022 10:25:16
Ed025, my opinion is neither Martinelli nor Virgil were red card offenses. Virgil's lacked force and Martinelli's lacked intent. Games going soft. I actually thought Partey on Diaz was worse. He's rugby tackled him with his whole body weight and hyper-extended Diaz's knee. I'm baffled how he not only escaped a yellow card, but didn't even concede the foul. It's not a red as the injury was unfortunate but Oliver missing it entirely was complete and utter incompetence.

I don't get the Saka offside moaning though. He's in line with Virgil and nothing annoys me more than some jobs-worth hundreds of miles away drawing lines to catch a forward offside by an inch. I play as a forward and if i were flagged for that on a Sunday morning i'd be foaming at the mouth. Saka was onside for me.

What i will say though is that was a stonewall penalty when Gabriel decided it was a game of volleyball and had that been Man City (home or away) we all know what the VAR decision would've been. And it was also a clear and obvious dive from Jesus. Opposition fans can't have it both ways. I've seen Salah and Mane accused of diving for going down under way more contact than that. Jesus cheated and VAR is supposed to be cleaning that kind of stuff up.

Either way though these poor decisions don't change the simple fact that teams are covering more mileage than us, sprinting more than us, winning more duels than us, and just generally putting in more effort. Whether it's physical fatigue, mental fatigue or just simply bad attitudes, who can say. But Trent, Gomez, Virgil, Robbo, Hendo, Fabinho and Salah have all been guilty at times this season of it. There was one incident against Arsenal many might have missed but that summed us up right now. In midfield there was a 50/ 50 between Hendo and Jesus, and Jesus absolutely bodied him. Hendo went flying. That is our captain who is supposed to be the powerhouse; the midfield general. Yet a short Brazilian striker absolutely bullied him. At this stage, the fragility of our spine this season is embarrassing.

It's not morale. It's not players leaving. It's sure as hell not Pep writing a book. I'm sick of the excuses. It's a lack of perspiration on the pitch and i don't know how Klopp can fix it. Nunez, Jota, Diaz and Firmino are the few bright sparks in recent weeks and now we've lost one of them too. Hopefully the 3 who are still fit can help us limp through to January still in all the cups and within touching distance of 4th place.

18.) 12 Oct 2022
12 Oct 2022 15:07:27
To end all the arguments LFC are officially changing their name to LiVARpool!

19.) 12 Oct 2022
12 Oct 2022 15:18:12
MK, whilst I agree with most of what you said, I can’t agree on the saka offside. It is borderline ridiculous to be measuring players off for a few mm, but that is the rule in place and supposedly we have the technology to implement it. He is actually more offside than it probably appears. If you look at the grass markings it looks about the same distance between man and line of grass, but remember matip is much further away from the camera. So in real terms will be further from that grass line. The current rules re offside determine why teams like ourselves and arsenal for that matter play with such a high line. We can’t dismiss the guess decision as ‘it’s pretty close’ because teams utilise defensive systems based on the rules and technology in place. What makes it worse was the timing, because it sets the tone for the game, ignites the crowd etc. That doesn’t obviously excuse certainly the second half performance.

As for the penalty decisions don’t get me started. Something I am struggling to deal with is how there seems to be a completely different set of rules for the penalty area compared to anywhere else on the pitch.

Cheers.

20.) 12 Oct 2022
12 Oct 2022 15:49:54
Top post MK, agree with everything you said. I’m not having that it’s because the squad is ageing or players need replacing either. Are Trent, Robbo and Fabinho seriously at the age where they’re finished and should be replaced? I’m not having it.

Players aren’t finished at 30 anymore, never mind 24. You could say it’s plausible that van Dijk and Henderson could have declined, but the criticisms of their play at the moment are the same ones that you could level at players who are a fair bit younger than them. Weak, limp, complacent, lazy, I could go on.

The reality is their effort levels have dropped and Klopp has allowed that to take hold. I believe the fact that our less established players are the only ones that play with any desire at all supports this theory. The ones that have been around the block have become complacent and lost their hunger. Like you say, I don’t know what Klopp does to fix it or if he has the balls to, because for me it’s time to make a statement and drop some big hitters to the bench.

21.) 12 Oct 2022
12 Oct 2022 16:05:01
The average age of the Liverpool squad and City squad is about 150 days. I never knew that could make such a difference ?‍♂️.

22.) 12 Oct 2022
12 Oct 2022 18:35:03
They're all about 5 months old then, Irish?

23.) 12 Oct 2022
12 Oct 2022 19:07:33
I agree with Ed025 the decisions did go against us. We should have had a penalty. There’s no consistency.