Howard Webb believes that it was ultimately wrong for Myles Lewis -S -SKILY to be sent against wolves – but has defended the decision of the officials anyway.
Lewis-Skelly received a straight red card in the first half of Arsenal's 1-0 win over Wolves in January by referee Michael Oliver, a decision confirmed by Var Darren England.
Mikel Arteta said that he 'absent' with the decision and experts reacted with shock, with Micah Richards 'the worst decision I have ever seen in the Premier League football history'.
Arsenal has since been fined £ 65,000 for their players who behave in an 'incorrect way' when Lewis-Skelly was sent.
In Tuesday's episode of Match Official's Mic'd Up on Sky Sports, the audio of the incident in which Oliver and the VAR officials are released is released.
And although Webb thinks it was wrong for Lewis-Skelly to be sent, he insists that it is not a 'terrible' decision.
“From the start we prefer a yellow card in this situation,” said Webb.
It was clear that the referee felt the actions of Myles Lewis -S -Skelly on the day, he saw the player withdrawing an opponent without any possibility or intention to play the ball – with the intention of stopping the opponent. And the referee sees a raised foot making high contact and the opponent went down.
'The referee thought it was seriously false game, the VAR checked the images to see if the call was clear and clearly wrong and he felt that it was not – when he saw that the contact was quite high on the leg.
'But we know that we need excessive power or brutality for serious false game and what we see here is that high contact [just] Take the leg fairly quickly.
'So for that reason everyone has almost formed the same conclusion in the game that this is inadequate in serious false play – because of that lighting schemes. Because the studs don't really go straight in the leg, they look inside before they come onto the foot.
“There are some considerations that can support a red card, but there are a whole series of others who say it is not entirely, so we prefer that this was a yellow card,” Webb said.
'The VAR did not want to repeat the situation, they were aware of the referee's call, unless it is clearly and clearly wrong. They did not find it at that level in the day and decided to leave it on the field as a red card.
'I have heard this to describe as a really terrible official decision. It is not! I understand why the referee saw this on the day as a serious error game campaign.
'We must be careful with delaying things and freezing things. We have talked about not doing, it can distort reality. We have to look at it at full speed, it looks at it [studs] And comes out fairly quickly.
“But it's an understandable decision on the field. Yes, we think the VAR should have been involved, but at the same time I can understand a bit why that did not happen at the moment.
“We listen to the game, we give back to the officials to try to ensure that we are in accordance with the expectations of the game and how we judge these things.”
More to follow.
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