Aston Villa fans have been fuming on Twitter over the handball decision given by VAR in their 4-0 defeat against Leicester City on Monday.
This comes after Villa Twitter account @villareport shared a post on their page that included an image of Tyrone Mings making contact with the ball in the Villa penalty area for which VAR gave a penalty to Leicester.
Did the ball hit Mings' shoulder or arm?
Shoulder
Arm
The image shows the ball appearing to make contact with Mings’ shoulder instead of his arm.
This post then gathered a lot of replies from Villa fans who were not pleased that this decision was given as the Foxes scored the penalty to make it 2-0.
Here’s a sample of Villa fans responding to the post:
https://twitter.com/villareport/status/1237129055960473602
VAR officials are scared to overturn the onfield referee. It’s awful and shouldn’t be happening.
— White Van Man Kyle (@WhiteVanManKyle) March 9, 2020
Shocking VAR referee error. No way penalty.
— Mario Oles (@Oles_Mario) March 9, 2020
Never handball. VAR new it but don’t want to overrule the puppet. oops! sorry I mean ref. The original decision made was incorrect and the video evidence shows a clear and obvious error. Goals change games.#AVFC
— Barry Cutler (@chubster83) March 10, 2020
The penalty was given after VAR decided Mings handled the ball illegally, before Jamie Vardy scored to double Leicester’s lead in the second half (per BBC Sport). Now that the image of when and where the ball struck Mings in the box has surfaced on Twitter, this has paved the way for lots of Villa fans to slate the decision to award the penalty.
Shocking decision but it’s Villa so we will always get those against us
— JJ (@Falklander365) March 9, 2020
Var not fit for purpose. It is supposed to stop howlers… this was one of them
— Ratman999 (@RatmanSkinner) March 9, 2020
More like shoulder ball !!!?
— Anthony Carter (@anthony1c7) March 10, 2020
What do we think?
The decision does seem slightly harsh as the ball could be seen as hitting Mings on the shoulder. But at the end of the day, blaming the officials and VAR for a penalty decision will not change the fact that Villa lost the game and as a result continue to find themselves in the relegation zone. The best thing for the club now would be to put this defeat behind them and focus on getting some points in their next few games to avoid the drop.