Manchester United’s entertaining 2-2 draw with Everton was overshadowed by a controversial decision in which referee Andy Madley overturned his decision to award the Toffees a late penalty
Michael Owen and Alan Shearer don’t typically see eye-to-eye, but they’re on the same page about the VAR fiasco during Manchester United’s clash with Everton.
The former England strikers, who infamously fell out at Newcastle, both felt that United were lucky to avoid conceding a last-minute penalty in Saturday’s 2-2 draw at Goodison Park. Referee Andy Madley initially awarded the Toffees a spot-kick after Ashley Young appeared to be tugged down by Harry Maguire and Matthijs de Ligt in the box but controversially reversed his decision after being sent to the monitor by VAR.
Speaking on Match of the Day, Shearer offered a scathing assessment of the review process, insisting there was “no need” for VAR to get involved. “Whatever happened to the high bar, clear and obvious and not re-refereeing games?” he asked.
“There was no need for VAR to get involved at all because it wasn’t a clear and obvious error. Yes, Ashley Young tries to make the most of it, but there’s two clear pulls on his shirt. It’s clear to see.”
Shearer was also left baffled by the lack of camera angles on offer during the review. “What is mind-boggling to me is that they don’t show him the correct angles,” the Toon legend fumed. “They show him one angle when it might look a bit of a dive, they show him another and then straight away he’s off [to overturn the decision] that would be most confusing to me.”
Owen thought the same, telling Premier League Productions: “They’ve not looked at the right angle, in my opinion. The referee needs to be given the angle from behind the goal, zoomed in.
“The VAR has let the referee down, in my opinion there. He’s not given him all the various angles that you need to form a full opinion of whether that’s a foul or not. He’s given him one angle across the 18-yard box and given it to him 10 times. He can see that after one replay, show him the whole lot, give him three, four, five angles.
“There are two angles that showed the shirt pull, not one of the replays showed the shirt pull and he’s going from side-on. VAR is to blame, not the referee. VAR didn’t give him the right angle.”
Echoing Owen and Shearer’s sentiments, ex-Premier League official Mark Halsey branded the incident “embarrassing” and said the decision to overturn the penalty was “clearly wrong”. Speaking to The Sun, he said: “VAR Matt Donohue should not have got involved because referee Andy Madley’s on-field call was in no way a clear and obvious error.
“When Madley went to the monitor on the advice of VAR he was then shown the wrong footage. They failed to take into account that Matthijs de Ligt had pulled Young back by the shirt. And had Madley been shown footage filmed from behind the goal he would have seen this. The incident was embarrassing.”
Everton manager David Moyes was similarly perplexed. “I can’t understand,” he said after the game. “[De Ligt] pulled his jersey. I just thought the referee made the correct decision at the time and he should stick with it… If it’s absolutely clear and obvious that’s what we’ve got VAR for, but I didn’t think it needed to get involved.”
The home side raced into a 2-0 lead thanks to first-half goals from Beto and Abdoulaye Doucoure, but United clawed their back in the second half, with Bruno Fernandes and Manuel Ugarte both netting stunning strikes to level the tie. The result leaves the Merseyside club a point and a place above Ruben Amorim’s side in 14th.
Everton’s form since Moyes returned in January has been very promising, with four wins, two draws and just two defeats in eight matches. They’re now 14 points clear of the relegation zone, and just three wins away from matching last season’s points total.
United, meanwhile, have won just two of their last 10 league games, and are staring down the barrel of their worst domestic finish for over half a century.
Owen and Shearer played together for England and Newcastle, but their relationship deteriorated during the latter’s stint in charge of the Magpies during the club’s ill-fated 2008/09 campaign, which ended in relegation from the Premier League. Owen had been blighted by injury woes for some time but nonetheless irked Shearer when he told him he wasn’t fit to play a full 90 minutes on the final day of the season.
Newcastle needed just a point to stay up but lost 1-0 to Aston Villa. Ever since bad blood has existed between the pair, who reportedly haven’t spoken since 2019. This was exacerbated when Owen admitted he regretted moving to St James’ Park.
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