Michael Ball furious over VAR decision in Everton v Tottenham
Michael Ball was left furious with the decision to overturn the penalty in the Everton draw with Tottenham on Sunday.
Speaking in his column for the Liverpool Echo, the former Toffees man was left raging at Chris Kavanagh’s decision to blow his whistle after Richarlison was deemed to be fouled by Hugo Lloris.
He also wasn’t happy with the fact that VAR overturned the decision despite the error not looking clear or obvious.
He said: “The decision to overturn Everton’s penalty against Tottenham Hotspur summed up the performance of the match officials for me as I thought they were a joke all game, and we could have done with a bit more luck from them.
“If the referee hadn’t blown, then Richarlison could have scored, or we might have had another opportunity, and then we could have gone to VAR to check the incident.
“The referee got that massively wrong by blowing up so early, giving them the penalty and then changing his mind.
“I don’t think many of us are fans of VAR; I still don’t understand the interpretation of what is a clear and obvious error.
“This incident for me wasn’t a clear and obvious error.”
Big claims from Ball.
The point about Kavanagh blowing his whistle makes a lot of sense as Lloris was miles out of his goal, and Richarlison stayed on his feet.
He could have played it to someone or had a shot himself, so the referee denied the Toffees a clear sight at goal.
Then if you look at the penalty incident, you can see that Lloris touches the ball but also catches Richarlison [Sky Sports YouTube].
So was it clear and obvious? We would argue that it wasn’t, and both Kavanagh and the VAR official have some explaining to do.
There was no point in him blowing his whistle with the Toffees shooting at an empty goal.
So, we can see why Ball was annoyed at what happened on Sunday as that moment in the game could have led to three valuable points for the Toffees, but it wasn’t to be.
Instead, they have to take the positives from the game and move on.
In other Everton news, Dermot Gallagher has provided his view on the penalty incident.
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