Paul Merson fumed at Mike Dean on live TV after the former Premier League referee suggested the controversial match between Tottenham and Liverpool couldn’t be stopped ‘for the sake of it’.
Luis Diaz had a goal ruled out for an offside after the VAR mistakenly believed the on-field decision had been to award the strike.
The PGMOL admitted immediately after Spurs’ 2-1 win that ‘a significant human error occurred’ when the Colombian’s goal was ruled out.
During a discussion on Soccer Saturday, Merson suggested that the match should have been stopped to award Liverpool a deserved goal.
Asked what the forward is, Dean said: ‘The way forward, do you get ex players in? For me no because I just don’t think, if you go get players in, half of them don’t know the laws of the game full stop as you can tell by what you (Merson) said about restarting games for the sake of it’.
Merson was then left outraged as he said: ‘For the sake of it? For the sake of it? What do you mean for the sake of it? You’re playing Liverpool against Tottenham, one of the biggest games and you’re saying for the sake of it.
‘There’s no law. No one is going to die so stop the game. You’re all scared. You’re all like “Oh my god I’m going to get in trouble”. Stop the game. Stop the game’.
Presenter Simon Thomas then urged Merson to calm down before the former striker added: ‘It’s typical you’ve not played the game,’ while Dean repeated ‘you can’t change the law’ multiple times.
Liverpool officially demanded the recording on Monday and their request was granted on Tuesday afternoon, with referee’s body PGMOL making the audio tape public on Tuesday night – which showed officials knew of their huge mistake immediately but still did not stop the game.
Moments after the match restarted after Diaz was ruled to have been offside, officials are heard to say ‘perfect’ and ‘well done boys, good process’.
The PGMOL said in a statement that ‘standards fell short of expectations’ and it has identified three key areas ‘to mitigate against the risk of a future error’.
A Premier League spokesperson on Tuesday night added: ‘It is clear that there were not only human errors but systemic weaknesses in the VAR process. We accept PGMOL’s immediate recommendations to ensure that such failures are not repeated in the future.
‘However, a wider review to seek consistently higher standards of VAR performance will be conducted by the Premier League and PGMOL and where necessary further recommended actions will be brought forward and implemented.’
