Danny Murphy has claimed on Match of the Day 2 that West Ham’s third goal should have been disallowed for a handball.
West Ham managed to pick up their third win of the season in the Premier League on Sunday afternoon despite going 1-0 down very early on with summer signing Gianluca Scamacca with the pick of the goals as he lobbed Bernd Leno.
On paper, it appears that it was a rather routine win for the Hammers as they ran out 3-1 winners at the London Stadium, but it was certainly far from that with VAR controversy throughout, including in the build-up to Michail Antonio’s late goal.
Murphy has referred to the laws of the game while speaking about Antonio’s goal as the ball struck his hand before racing through on goal to settle the game.
(0:01) “So the simple thing for me is that if you go by the letter of the law it should be disallowed and a handball [given].
Should Antonio's goal have been ruled out?
Yes!
No!
TIF Thoughts on Antonio’s goal…
While Antonio’s goal came late in the game so Fulham would likely have stated defeat anyway against their city rivals, it won’t make them feel any better that VAR appeared to ignore a rather blatant handball.
It wasn’t just Antonio’s goal either, but also Scamacca’s strike appeared to hit his arm before going in and this was also allowed to stand after VAR ruled it a legitimate goal, so it’s natural that Marco Silva should feel aggrieved.
Given Fulham took an early lead it will be a bitter pill to swallow for Silva as his side have now shipped seven goals in their last two games and in the end, been quite comfortably beaten both times.