Journalist Craig Hope has delivered his verdict on Newcastle United’s disallowed goal from their Carabao Cup clash this week.
Speaking on his YouTube channel, Hope described the decision as ‘strange’ and joked that ‘all is forgiven’ with VAR, which isn’t used in the competition.
Callum Wilson put the ball in the back of the net after 26 minutes, but the goal was chalked off due to Joe Willock being involved in the play, with the midfielder falling over when trying to get out of the way as the ball fell to Wilson.
And while the Magpies were able to pick up the 1-0 win thanks to an own goal from Adam Smith, Hope wasn’t exactly impressed with the decision.
Hope stated: “Bring back VAR. Listen, all is forgiven, eh? Any time any of us have had [criticism] – I’m saying this as a neutral reporter as well, you just want to see decisions that are right and I thought they got that one wrong in the first half.”
“Newcastle had a goal disallowed on about 20 minutes, I think it was, when Callum Wilson scored.
“And it was strange, because the referee, John Brooks, gave the goal, and you think ‘okay, no VAR, wow, isn’t that nice, a goal is given.’ Because it did look strange, the way the ball bounced around the area, there was bodies all over the place, and it’s the sort of goal if it was scored with VAR, you would sort of wait and expect there to be a pretty thorough check.
“But nothing was signalled, the goal was given, and you thought, ‘wow, great, this is how it used to be’. Then a combination of two things, Bournemouth protested, and Newcastle’s body language almost portrayed a guilt in many ways.
“Kieran Trippier motioned to the dugout as if to say, ‘was it offside, Callum Wilson didn’t really celebrate?’ And I think that sort of planted a seed of doubt in the official’s mind.”
TIF Thoughts on Hope’s comments…
We believe that the decision to overturn the goal was very strange. There was no signal from either the referee or the linesman that Willock was offside and was given after plenty of appeals from Bournemouth.
Had there been VAR in operation, the goal could easily have been ruled out as Willock could have been considered to be interfering with play despite attempting to move out of the way.
However, the midfielder may have just been onside with the last player back, Jaidon Anthony – although it’s hard to see from the camera angles shown.
As controversial as VAR is at times, it’s best that it should perhaps be implemented for the Carabao Cup to prevent decisions like this from happening. On another day, it could’ve led to Newcastle being eliminated from the competition.
But with Newcastle involved in the quarter-finals of the competition, the Magpies have no need to worry about VAR’s absence – for now, at least.