Yahoo News Steve Cooper slams 'awful error' after 'false' Leicester City VAR decision as referee meeting held
Leicester City were the victims of an "awful human error" in their 2-2 draw at Crystal Palace with the club forwarding footage to the Premier League that manager Steve Cooper believes shows proof of an incorrect VAR decision.
Cooper is convinced that Jean-Philippe Mateta was offside when Tyrick Mitchell delivered his cross for the French striker’s first goal at Selhurst Park. He claims City have presented footage to the Premier League that proves as such.
Mateta was initially flagged offside by the assistant, but that decision was overruled by VAR. The first image released by the Premier League on their social media channels showed Mateta stood in front of Wout Faes and Caleb Okoli, and was not conclusive. Later in the day, a wide-angle shot was released showing a line drawn from James Justin’s outstretched foot.
READ MORE:Leicester City press conference live as Steve Cooper talks injuries, selection, and Everton
But Cooper says the Premier League stopped the footage at the wrong time, after Mitchell had crossed the ball. He believes if that play had been frozen at the time the ball is released, the so-called 'kick-point', Mateta is in an offside position. He is insistent that the image released to media does not show the truth of the situation.
It's understood that referees body PGMOL do not share City's view, and that they maintain that the final decision reached was the right one, with the correct process followed and the correct 'kick-point' chosen. That was explained to City in a meeting on Monday.
Senior official Martin Atkinson, now working for PGMOL, was in attendance, and the process by which the referees came to their decision was explained to the club. City then sent footage to the Premier League that Cooper believes confirmed the decision was incorrect, but he says they have not received a response since.
“It was an awful human error that we believe has been hidden in the media,” Cooper said at his press conference on Thursday afternoon. “That has been as disappointing as the decision.
“At the time, we didn’t feel like the decision was right. We asked for clarity. We have seen images and where they froze it, it was at the wrong time. It was deemed to be onside. Everything that has been seen by the media has been a false image. The meeting we had on Monday with the Premier League, we showed them clear footage that the game was stopped at the wrong time.
“Decisions go against you, and we have had a massive error go against us. We don’t want it to go under the radar because I don’t think that would be right of the players and for the supporters. So even though it might be hidden in the media, it’s our obligation to bring it up.
“We’ve been really hard done by. We’ve been let down. We’ve told the Premier League what our thoughts are, and the referee department, and they met us on Monday.
“We asked them to explain why they came to the decision they did, and it confirmed to us it was wrong in terms of when they stopped the game. We showed them some broadcast footage and other broadcast footage that’s not been anywhere near the media.
“The images they’ve used are the ones where they did stop it, and he is onside, but they stop it after the ball has been kicked. If they stopped it when the ball has been kicked, they’d have seen he was offside. But they did it after the ball had left the foot.
“We’ve seen some clear images of that. We can’t release them and we won’t. We sent our presentation to them and the footage and we’ve not heard anything back.
“Everything you see on Match of the Day or Sky has been false in terms of the decision because it was stopped at the wrong time. We showed them the real footage and some extra footage we have. We presented it to them, we gave it to them, but we haven’t heard anything back since.
“We felt very let down by it and we needed to stand up for the club, the players, and supporters, and tell them what we thought. It doesn’t change the result. We’ll be on the end of good and bad decisions that will influence the game like that one did.
“But own up to it. Don’t hide behind it. Have the humility to go: ‘We made a big mistake there and we’ll learn from it’. That’s what managers will be doing and players will be doing. We need to see the same from referees. He didn’t intend to make a mistake, but he made a massive mistake.”
