By Bulldog Drummond
According to the Daily Mail, the PGMO is “baffled by the explanation from Hawk-Eye after their technology failed to spot a ball going over the line in the recent Sheffield United game. However the claim is that the technology did not malfunction.
Hawk-Eye said the Goal Decision System’s seven cameras were obscured by the goalkeeper, a defender and the goalpost, but refereeing sources say they are ‘confused’ by that claim. Hawk-Eye have also suggested that before the game PGMO officials tested smothering the ball, hiding it behind the post and pushing it into the side-netting — and Hawk-Eye always worked.
Hawk-Eye have said (according to the Daily Mail) that VAR will monitor these situations from now on. The Daily Mail have said that “Sheffield United have been told they may have a legal case against the Premier League and Hawk-Eye, should the decision cost them a place in Europe.”
Meanwhile in the bewildering land of football, Arsenal are away to Brighton. So what about the teams…
The Sun provide this possible line up
Leno
Bellerin Holding Mustafi Tierney
Guendouzi Ceballas
Pepe Ozil Aubameyang
Nketiah
The Standard have a variation by including Saka and moving Tierney to the centre of defence, keeping Willock in the team and having Lacazette up front.
Leno;
Bellerin, Mustafi, Tierney, Saka;
Ceballos, Guendouzi;
Pepe, Willock, Aubameyang;
Lacazette
The BBC tell us that “Mesut Ozil’s fitness continues to be assessed ahead of a potential recall,” and continue the criticism of Arsenal for not taking an earlier plane to Manchester.
But there is a little positivity in their review with the added comment, “But at least Arsenal have played now. I do think the teams with a game under their belt will benefit a lot, fitness-wise. In a strange way, the fact they went down to 10 men and got a bit of a chasing might help in that area too.
“Before it all went wrong for them, the Gunners did look quite lively on the counter-attack at Etihad Stadium and the same approach might work for them here.”
As usual they also come up with a few oddball factoids the most interesting of which is that Aubameyang is about to take over the record for the fewest Premier League appearances at Arsenal to score 50 League goals.
He has scored 49 goals in 76 league appearances. Thierry Henry holds the Arsenal record for fewest appearances to reach 50 Premier League goals, taking a leisurely 83 matches. Mind you, he wasn’t the Henry we remember, during that first season.
Here are a few other bits from the BBC…
- Ninth-placed Arsenal have lost only one of their 17 league fixtures against teams currently below them in the table (W8, D8). However we should also note that that defeat was against Brighton.
- Arsenal have scored only eight league goals outside of London this term, with Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang providing seven of those.
- Arsenal have had a league-high three players sent off since Mikel Arteta became head coach in December.
Sports Mole predict a 1-1 draw and suggest the team will be
Leno;
Bellerin, Sokratis, Mustafi, Saka;
Ceballos, Guendouzi;
Pepe, Willock, Aubameyang;
Lacazette
Interestingly, the Guardian, who we always used to include in our team predictions, seems to have given up the ghost as they don’t have a word about the match on their website this morning. I wonder, have they had enough of Arsenal?
THE ACTUAL TEAM
- Martinez
- Medley
The slavery files
- MP stance on football should fill us all with disgust
- If all lives matter, if slavery is unaccepable, what is the FA doing about Qatar?
- British media universally continues to support modern slavery
I can’t help but wonder where was the linesman in the Sheffield United incident. Before we had any technology the official on the pitch would have been required to keep up with play in an observant manner. Has this been left to fall by the wayside due to the reliance on the cameras and wrist devices? Should there not be an examination of why the officials failed to see a very obvious goal? I now suspect some manipulation of their results to prevent the 2 points being the difference between them qualifying for Europe or not.
The linesman in question was in the correct position by the corner flag to see what had happened and should have flagged the ref. to make a comment. He didn’t because I believe that linesmen have been told not to interfere with technology decisions.This is crazy but what do you expect from rule makers these days ? They are afraid to make decisions and let technology do everything instead.
Earlier this season a Newcastle player was flagged offside and United players stopped playing. The Newcastle player jogged up field and casually kicked the ball into the net. Var subsequently ruled that he was not offside and the goal was allowed to stand. The players were told to ignore linesmen waiving flags. You cannot win with these new rules !!
Surely the VAR official in the Sheffield United goal line technology farce could clearly see the ball was over the line in the replays so why did he not intervene. It’s bizarre and yet another example of the PGMOB incompetence.
The blind PGMOL at their usual best! Choosing not to see a blatant kick on Pepe. These cheating bastards need to be outed by someone in the clubs management.
Yes, no chance of getting the ball whatsoever so had a kick
Elbow to Saka’s face and no VAR check! Leno takes the ball cleanly on the edge of his area and gets clattered. Another RED card for the opposition but nothing given!!
I thought the idea was to protect keepers
** Sub rule eleventy four – Unless that keeper plays for Arsenal
Leno rightly points in anger at Moupay who clattered him. PGMOL and their VAR cheats ignore all.
good chances in injury time
Hitting a player in the air is an instant red card in rugby because of the potential for serious injury on landing. Very sensible.
So how is it that Atkinson doesn’t even consider it to be reckless or dangerous and award a yellow at the very least? That either unimaginable ineptitude of deliberate bias. It’s hard to reach any other conclusion.
The pundits say its unfortunate!!! Leno gets the ball and shields it but get shoulder barged despite this. Atkinson bottled the RED card twice within 7 minutes. One for an elbow to the face of Saka and the second for a challenge on a keeper with no chance of getting the ball.
The only unfortunate thing is that both get away with the Arsenal rule ‘if it is wrong on an Arsenal player it is lawful’. Taking a knee has lost its meaning when such blatant anti Arsenal decision making goes on.
Lacazette gets a yellow for touching their keeper. The whole team should buy him a beer. A signal has to be sent that we are not happy with those who touch our keeper.
a beauty by Pepe
So, cheats do prosper.
Why do we even bother to turn up anymore ,we all know refs have a different set of rules when Arsenal take to the pitch,already we have lost 2 big players to long injuries and God knows how many more before the end of the season .The PGMOL will probably give us Oliver on Thursday and finish off “refs from hell” with Dean next Sunday we will be lucky to have a 5 a side team come the start of July.Finally I think we all could see what was going to happen when Atkinson didnt even speak to Maupy but couldnt get the yellow out quick enough for Laca as I said different rules.
All of the honesty of professional wrestling.!
Boss said we was crap Shame on him
Maupay’s comments after the match have ensured him a lifetime of Gooner enmity.
this is interesting
https://www.reddit.com/r/Gunners/comments/hcpumb/yves_bissouma_conceded_six_fouls_against_arsenal/
It is quite obvious that Maupay’s intent was to get Leno over the line which would have incurred a yellow or even a red card. He knew that there was no way he could get to the ball so his challenge was a real jump into back of Leno which resulted in Leno having no control about how he would balance himself on landing.
Maupay said Arsenal “got what they deserved”. It’s a shame Vieira wasn’t still playing, then Maupay would have got what he deserved!
FYI, Attwood has refereed Arsenal for the 6th time this season…out of 30 games that is one in 5
Add to that 2 appearances as 4th official, the second time was against City a few days ago
And he did VAR once.
Tell me this is NOT STRANGE !
Another bizarre incident was the foul on Kolasinaci which should have resulted in a penalty for Arsenal. So Atkinson quickly invented a foul from another Arsenal player (probably for being on the field and having the audacity to even dare to challenge for the loose ball) so he could give a free kick for Brighton. That was with the score being 1-1….
Mind you I am furious by the way we played after going 0-1 in front. Why oh why did we just lean back after that goal and allowed Brighton to get in to the match? Where are the days that we had a manager who would chase us further forward after having scored a goal in order to score a second or third goal to give ourselves a margin. Oh yes, thats right, we had to get rid of that manager….