Howard Webb, England’s chief refereeing officer, has admitted that the decision to disallow Josh King’s goal for Fulham against Chelsea was a “misjudgment” by match officials. The goal was controversially ruled out after a VAR review during Saturday’s derby at Stamford Bridge.
King appeared to have scored his first league goal for Fulham, but referee Robert Jones was sent to the pitchside monitor following a check by video assistant referee Michael Salisbury. The goal was chalked off because Fulham’s Rodrigo Muniz was judged to have stepped on Chelsea defender Trevoh Chalobah’s foot during the build-up.
Speaking on the Match Officials Mic’d Up programme, Webb said: “It wasn’t controversial, it was wrong. We’ve established principles around a high threshold for penalising contact and for VAR intervention. If situations are not clearly wrong, the referee’s call should stand. That guidance wasn’t followed properly in this case.”
Webb explained that the officials became “super-focused” on the contact between Muniz and Chalobah without considering the full context. “Muniz is in possession, turns naturally and brings his foot down onto Chalobah, who moved his foot into a space the Fulham player had the right to put his foot into,” he added.
Following the error, VAR official Michael Salisbury was stood down from his duties for the subsequent Premier League fixture between Liverpool and Arsenal.
