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Howard Webb breaks silence on ‘clear and obvious error’ in William Saliba’s red card for Arsenal

Posted on by Pranco
Howard Webb breaks silence on ‘clear and obvious error’ in William Saliba’s red card for Arsenal

Arsenal fans have been frustrated by refereeing decisions for most of the season, having already received three red cards in the Premier League.

Mikel Arteta The side are already off the pace in the hunt for the title and face an uphill battle to win the division after a difficult start to the season.

Injuries have hit the Gunners, along with some poor performances, although the issue of refereeing decisions has cropped up a few times.

Declan Rice, Leandro Trossard And William Saliba have all seen red this season for different reasons, even if they are reasons that the supporters don’t agree with.

The latest of these came in a clash against Bournemouth, where the defender appeared to be the last man standing before bringing down Evanilson, resulting in a send-off that led to Arsenal lose the match.

Former referee, now PGMOL chief Howard Webb watches from the stands during the Premier League match between AFC Bournemouth and Arsenal FC in Vital...
Photo by Catherine Ivill – AMA/Getty Images

Howard Webb discusses William Saliba’s red card against Bournemouth

There was a sense of frustration over Saliba’s red card at Bournemouth as the damage was self-inflicted as Leandro Trossard’s poor back pass sparked the situation.

Referee Robert Jones initially gave a yellow card, but upon VAR review he overturned that decision to upgrade it to a red card.

It was seen as a denial of a clear scoring opportunity (DOGSO for short), even though some claimed he was still far from the goal at the time.

PGMOL chief Howard Webb has clarified the situation as he said on Match Officials Mic’d Up: “I think William Saliba’s foul in this situation has denied Evanilson a clear scoring opportunity. I think the yellow card issued by Rob Jones on the pitch was clearly wrong.

“There are two things VAR can do here to prove that the decision on the pitch was wrong. First of all, you can see that Ben White is still a ways away. He won’t get to Evanlison from that position and secondly they can see that David Raya is pulling back and when the ball dies in front of Evanilson, even if it is some distance from goal, he goes for the ball.

“He gets the time to get a nice control so that the goalkeeper can beat him. As far as I am concerned, a good intervention by the VAR, a clear and obvious mistake in not showing a red card on the field.”

Howard Webb, referee observer, attends the UEFA EURO 2024 group stage match between France and Poland at Dortmund Football Stadium on June 25, 2024...
Photo by Andreas Rentz – UEFA/UEFA via Getty Images

Red card complaint Chelsea compared to Arsenal

There was one frustration with the consistency of some Arsenal fans that weekend when they saw a similar foul in Chelsea’s game with Liverpool.

Defender Tosin Adarabioyo brought down Diogo Jota as the apparent last man, in a similar situation to Saliba, but was only shown a yellow card.

Webb tried to clarify that, adding: “Colwill has a lot of time to come back from a close position at Jota and could have undoubtedly influenced the obviousness of this situation, I think.”

While that may be the case, some may argue that White could have overtaken Evanilson, although there was no certainty about that.

Either way, discipline has been costly for the Gunners so far this season and they now face the challenge of regaining the lost points.

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