Liverpool fans fume as Howard Webb ‘hiding away’ from Pascal Gross red card call

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Liverpool fans have accused referees’ chief Howard Webb of ‘hiding away’ from another contentious decision involving their side.

Webb has appeared on the new Match Officials: Mic’d Up show, where the PGMOL boss sheds light on high-profile and controversial decisions as part of a drive for greater transparency. Naturally, Luis Diaz’s disallowed goal against Tottenham – the result of a VAR communications cock-up – took centre stage while a number of other decisions were analysed.

However, another call which went against Jurgen Klopp’s side was overlooked. When Brighton’s Pascal Gross conceded a penalty for bringing down Dominik Szoboszlai on Sunday, he escaped a card as VAR deemed him not to have denied a clear goalscoring opportunity.

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Mo Salah scored from the spot to give Liverpool the lead but Brighton levelled in the second half as the match ended 2-2. However, some Liverpool fans were adamant Gross should have seen red and hit out at Webb for not discussing it on Mic’d Up.

One asked: “Where’s the red card that wasn’t given? Not a goalscoring opportunity my a***. Dom just taps it in if he’s not dragged back.”

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Another moaned: “Never any of the subjective #LFC ones. Jones/Mac Allister/Szob chat.” A third commented: “So Webb hiding away the audio from the Gross challenge v Liverpool then. No surprise there.”

PGMOL rules offer a clue as to why Gross stayed on the pitch, although the absence of at least a booking will still surprise some.

The rules state: “Where a player commits an offence against an opponent within their own penalty area which denies an opponent an obvious goal-scoring opportunity and the referee awards a penalty kick, the offender is cautioned if the offence was an attempt to play the ball or a challenge for the ball; in all other circumstances (e.g. holding, pulling, pushing, no possibility to play the ball etc.), the offending player must be sent off.”

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