JAKARTA - The head of the Premier League referee, Howard Webb, said the referee's decision to annull Virgil van Dijk's header when Liverpool lost to Manchester City at the end of last week was right.
Liverpool contacted Webb, Head of the Professional Game Referee Match Officials Limited (PGMOL), on Monday, November 10, 2025, local time to raise concerns about the interpretation of the offside rules after Van Dijk's header was ruled out by referee Chris Kavanagh.
Andy Robertson was clearly in an offside position as he looked down at the ball, but Liverpool argued that he was not in goalkeeper Gianluigi Donnarumma's line of sight and did not interfere with the game.
SEE ALSO:
It was an important moment because Liverpool were 0-1 behind. After the match, Reds Manager, Arne Slot, said that clearly and openly a wrong decision had been made.
While Webb said that the decision on whether a player interferes with the game or not is some of the most subjective decisions to make, he felt match officials had made the right decision.
"I know it's not the view everyone holds, but I think it makes sense to understand why they came to that conclusion."
"When the player is very close to the goalkeeper, the ball comes straight at him, he has to look down to avoid the ball."
"The match officials came to the conclusion that it affected Donnarumma's save of the ball," Webb said at Match Officials Mic'd Up at TNT Sports.
A statement from the Premier League Match Center at the time of the incident claimed Robertson was deemed to have taken clear action right in front of goalkeepers, Liverpool disagreed with the premise.
Liverpool believe that the formulation of Law 11 (which deals with offside violations) is clear and argues that no element of criteria is needed to annull such goals fulfilled.
After analyzing all available points of view, the club did not accept that Donnarumma's views were hindered by Robertson's presence.
The decision on the pitch was offside, but VAR Michael Oliver did not ask referee Kavanagh to watch the incident again on the sidelines.
Liverpool argues that if the goal is confirmed, different results may be achieved.
"After they make a decision on the pitch, it's VAR's job to look at it and decide whether the offside results are clear and real wrong?"
"VAR determines that offside results are unclear and real wrong and they don't interfere," Webb said.
The English, Chinese, Japanese, Arabic, and French versions are automatically generated by the AI. So there may still be inaccuracies in translating, please always see Indonesian as our main language. (system supported by DigitalSiber.id)
