Friend – and VAR – turn into Crystal Palace’s enemies as big calls go against them in Liverpool loss
Although the Crystal Palace players failed to appeal for the decision during the phase of play, a replay of Liverpool’s second goal showed that Roberto Firmino was offside for Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain’s strike.
While VAR, which was being operated by Craig Pawson, checked the replay, he did not believe that the Brazilian’s position on the pitch impacted the goal.
Friend then awarded a penalty to Liverpool in the 89th minute when Diogo Jota collided with Vicente Guaita. However, the spot-kick was only given after a lengthy period of stoppage and multiple replays of various angles.
The Eagles had been pushing for an equaliser in the final moments of the game after Odsonne Edouard halved Liverpool’s lead in the 55th minute.
Asked about Firmino’s offside claim, Vieira said: “Possible offside is a word that isn’t acceptable in our world – he is offside, or he is not offside.
“He either has an impact on the game, or he doesn’t have an impact on the game. He had an impact on the situation, so he must be offside.
“On the penalty, I don’t even want to talk about it because I don’t want to be disrespectful to the referee today.
“I can’t understand how he managed to award that penalty – I looked at every single angle, and I still don’t understand how that can be a penalty.
“That decision took our hope away to get back into the game and to get a point. That was a really poor decision by the referee.”
Expanding on his thoughts about why he believed Jota should not have been awarded a penalty in the 89th minute, Vieira added: “The reason behind that was having those meetings with the referees and them explaining to coaches that contact is part of the game.
“If there was a situation such as that, where it’s not an obvious contact, there wasn’t going to be any penalties awarded.
“I believe when you’re looking at Jota, who I believe was quite smart, at the same time, the referee or the VAR was quite naive.
“There was no way that Jota could get the ball back and try to score.”
