I did see someone reference the game against Brighton last season where Lamptey gave away a penalty against Jesus for a challenge where he also touched the ball. I get the ball hit his head but Saliba still made contact with their player after the ball is gone.

I think we are very unlucky that it got called because many times you get the benefit of the doubt but once it is I think VAR aren't going to intervene because Saliba did contact the player after the ball is gone.

A bit like Rice va Brighton, I’ve never seen this given. Feels like we signed up for the PGMOL experimentation package.

Does anyone know what is going on with Sky and the refs? Why do they keep backing their dreadful decisions?

The sky "studio" were unanimous it was a pen yesterday and 1 of the reasons was because Gabriel + Saliba were chaotic in that moment...it is starting to make their coverage unwatchable.

And then you get objective coverage from MoTD:

These decisions have been sucking a lot of joy out of what really should be a good Arsenal season.

A few debatable or wrong calls against us is normal but we've suffered a number of bizarre and unorthodox calls that are hard to explain except by way of tinfoil hat thinking.

Panda it’s just authority dick sucking

Panda Does anyone know what is going on with Sky and the refs? Why do they keep backing their dreadful decisions?

It's every game now since they got their ref show. They're doing it right now on 2 decisions not given to Fulham.

awooga83 I did see someone reference the game against Brighton last season where Lamptey gave away a penalty against Jesus for a challenge where he also touched the ball.

I think this is a valid point and this is why I don't necessarily think the penalty was all that crazy of a call. One thing I will say, however, is that if we're going to referee upper body contact in the same way that we referee lower body contact (and I think we probably should, on the merits) then the Brighton player that Superman-jumped into Declan Rice's face should have gotten a red card.

This is phenomenal from Dermot.

"people say he got the ball - he didn't, the ball got him" is something else. Been calling for PL refs to get stabbed, publicly castrated etc pp since the days of Mike Riley but this punditry is a whole new level. Calciopoli is calm compared to what we're watching every weekend

jones

JazzG they never even noticed Saliba getting the ball. I'm not 100% either way on the decision itself but that check was too quick and didn't focus on what actually mattered. Dermot Gallaghers "he touched it but didn't head it" is a bullshit distinction that doesn't matter. You can see from the whole thing that VAR never noticed Salibas touch because they rushed it and they are just making excuses now.

Qwiss all that happened there was the referee had a bad angle. He stuck to his poor decision. And his buddies in VAR backed him because it’s a bad look to contradict each other. Dermot similarly fell in line.

PGMOL should be a case study on group think and conformity biases. Because their actions consistently show that they haven’t developed mechanisms for disagreement.

JazzG can't see the link Sky is geo blocked. Thank God, would've just made my blood pressure spike

Qwiss does it even matter if he touched the ball? I can't remember a single instance of a clash of heads leading to a penalty.

In both cases I can't see why Taylor would be awarding a red and relying on the VAR to overrule rather than awarding a yellow or waving play on, with the option of the VAR increasing any penalty on review.

There's a skill deficit among top flight referees. Not sure how to fix it unless Howard Webb is cleared out first.