Tottenham and Aston Villa experienced some VAR troubles in the opening seconds of their Premier League match on Sunday. As reported by several broadcasters, there were some glitches with VAR, and while those issues were quickly handled, veteran Premier League referee Dermot Gallagher has provided some clarity on what happened at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium.
“The VAR was working. The feed was coming into Stockley Park, and they could see everything; the problem was that it wasn’t relaying to the monitor in the stadium,” he said on Sky Sports News’ Ref Watch. “So, if a VAR checked an incident, he would have had to transmit his findings to the referee. “The referee couldn’t get to the monitor.”
Regarding the game continuing despite the obstacles, he stated, “The referee is there to referee the game.” The VAR serves as a backup. It only took 10 minutes for it to be remedied, but in that time, they were at the mercy of the VAR. Everyone on the ground realized [it wasn’t working]. It was communicated to all broadcasters, and I could hear the VAR tell the referee, ‘This has been cleared’. So they were checking everything as it happened.”
While it was only out of play for a short period of time, it was a raucous start to the game, with many Spurs fans upset at decisions that did not go their way. The first came after Dejan Kulusevski ‘sBrennan Johnson fired a shot that struck the post, and Emiliano Martinez failed to deal with it.
