Gary Neville ‘changes his tune’ criticising Liverpool over their brutal response to PGMOL

Gary Neville ‘changes his tune’ by criticising Liverpool over their brutal response to PGMOL over the VAR error at Tottenham on Saturday.

Liverpool said that “sporting integrity has been undermined” by the video assistant referee (VAR) error in the 2-1 Premier League defeat after VAR went against overturning an incorrect decision to disallow a Luis Diaz goal for offside.

The VAR officials were stood down from duty for the rest of the weekend with PGMOL, the governing body for referees, saying the decision to disallow the goal was “a significant human error”.

Am I missing something? Luis Díaz looks well onside.

I understand the angles bad, but the cut of grass makes it look very onside #TOTLIV pic.twitter.com/7IT4LafxAW

— Robotto (@TheSirRobotto) September 30, 2023

“PGMOL acknowledge a significant human error occurred during the first half of Tottenham Hotspur v Liverpool.”

The PGMOL statement on the Luis Diaz disallowed goal. 👇 pic.twitter.com/qC2C0jMsXD

— Sky Sports Premier League (@SkySportsPL) September 30, 2023

 

Reacting to PGMOL’s statement live on Sky Sports, Neville said: “At the time – we get VAR up on the commentary box before anybody else does – I thought, ‘that’s onside’.

“All of a sudden they said, ‘check complete’. We were like, ‘what?’

“No lines, it was too quick. Something was obviously wrong.

“That is unbelievable. That is a bad one. They said [in the statement], ‘significant’. That is very significant.

“There was a couple in the last few weeks that I thought haven’t been right and I’ve been asking us [Sky], ‘have we got the right cameras at these stadiums?’

“I’ve defended VAR and offside as being a matter of fact. But there’s been two or three in the last few weeks, where I’ve behind the scenes thought, ‘that doesn’t feel right, have they drawn the lines on?’”

“Something doesn’t feel right.”

Gary Neville says the VAR check for the disallowed Luis Diaz goal was ‘too quick’ and questions why the lines weren’t drawn on 🤔 pic.twitter.com/UbaP5iXyb5

— Sky Sports Premier League (@SkySportsPL) September 30, 2023

🗣️ “I don’t know why the people in VAR are that much under pressure?”

Jurgen Klopp’s reaction after Luis Diaz’ goal was wrongfully disallowed 📺❌ pic.twitter.com/GL6AGj3g6P

— Football Daily (@footballdaily) October 2, 2023

Posting via Twitter, Gary Neville slammed the decision-making in the match but insisted it ‘isn’t a sackable offence’.

‘The VAR mistake was a really bad one. However we’ve all been demanding quicker decisions and I think they have tried to enforce speed in decision making.

‘Speed will cause inaccuracy and it’s now about a rebalance. – the two officials have been taken off their next games. Imagine how they feel this morning and let’s be human.

‘There should be consequence for such errors but in my opinion a couple of games out is more than enough.

‘Think of it as a player suspension for a sending off. This isn’t a sackable offence by any stretch so let’s remove that language – Sorry doesn’t mean anything. It does. It’s an important value all our parents have tried to instill in us.

‘Taking responsibility and owning your mistakes is important and should be valued. – finally enjoy your Sunday and I look forward to the abuse for this tweet,’ he added.

Liverpool Football Club acknowledges PGMOL’s admission of their failures last night.

It is clear that the correct application of the laws of the game did not occur, resulting in sporting integrity being undermined.

— Liverpool FC (@LFC) October 1, 2023

LIVERPOOL STATEMENT

Liverpool Football Club acknowledges PGMOL’s admission of their failures last night. It is clear that the correct application of the laws of the game did not occur, resulting in sporting integrity being undermined.

We fully accept the pressures that match officials work under but these pressures are supposed to be alleviated, not exacerbated, by the existence and implementation of VAR.

It is therefore unsatisfactory that sufficient time was not afforded to allow the correct decision to be made and that there was no subsequent intervention.

That such failings have already been categorised as “significant human error” is also unacceptable. Any and all outcomes should be established only by the review and with full transparency.

This is vital for the reliability of future decision-making as it applies to all clubs with learnings being used to make improvements to processes in order to ensure this kind of situation cannot occur again.

In the meantime, we will explore the range of options available, given the clear need for escalation and resolution.

This caught the attention of Gary Neville, who then said: ‘Jurgen Klopp handled the situation well last night after the game. Most football fans will have had empathy with what happened and recognised it was wrong!

‘However, Liverpool’s statement tonight is a mistake! Talk of exploring all options (what does that mean!!!) and sporting integrity are dangerous phrases along with being vague and aggressive.

‘Sorry we f***ed up was enough!! I said this last night. Sorry should be respected and not undervalued.

‘This is a snap reaction that can always be wrong but I feel strongly about it.’

Neville also retweeted a number of posts which criticised both Liverpool’s statement along with the very application of VAR since it was introduced, before dismissing a claim from a Liverpool fan that there needed to be repercussions, saying: ‘What would that look like mate? It’s a f*** up. We’ve all done it.’

What would you like mate? It’s a f@@k up! We’ve all done it https://t.co/NIInL5lw2L

— Gary Neville (@GNev2) October 1, 2023

Twitter users reacted as Gary Neville ‘changes his tune’ criticising Liverpool over their brutal response to PGMOL…

@TheKopHQ: Would you be happy if your beloved Man Utd just rolled over, got their bellies tickled & accepted the apology and brushed it under the carpet?

@NottsCountyZone: Gary Neville changed his tune very quickly, big wad of cash?

@AnfieldMagic: I’ll never understand you, fully on our side last night and now against us 🤣

@colingrist: We can’t use “we’ve all made a mistake” when stuff like this happens in every single game though.

@Brett_leverton: Gary you can’t go on TV and say you have been worried about offsides “for weeks” and then play this down as just a “we’ve all done it”. The more people brush it under the carpet the less likely they’ll work hard to improve.

@lfcbootroom_: It’s a chance for evolution, improvements, learnings simply accepting an apology you rob yourself and other fans of that. VAR has being a talking point week in/week out, you literally moan about this all the time.

@TheImmortalKop: So we continuously allow these incompetent referees to get away with these mistakes as long as they say sorry? That’s not good enough for the biggest sporting league in the world

@LfcSammm: If the glazers said sorry would it be ok Gary?

@PartedBeard: You are part of the problem. You have a huge platform to push for more transparency and accountability within PGMOL, but instead you trivialize the issues. The “we’ve all done it” doesn’t answer many of the unanswered questions about this specific case or the way forward.

@AdamRynhart: If someone doesn’t speak up @GNev2 it’s gonna keep happening and happening until something is done to correct it. It’s not just us that it’s happened too. We should all be getting onboard for positive changes to the officiating in the so called best league in the world.

@AidanGill02: Ah yes, just last week I fucked up the result of a game in a multi-billion pound industry with multi-million pounds worth of equipment. Sorry, what am I like 🤣🤣👍🏻👍🏻