Sports

Premier League Match Officials Have Apologized For Errors 14 Times In Two Seasons

Published

2 October 2023

2:53 PM

The Professional Game Match Officials Limited (PGMOL), the body coordinating Premier League Match Officials, have had to apologize 14 times between the 2022-2023 and 2023-2024 season over obvious errors.

The latest of those series of errors happened on September 30, 2023, when Liverpool traveled to north London to take on Tottenham Hotspur in their 7th Premier League game of the season.

During the game, the match officials ruled out Luis Diaz’s goal for offside and the VAR decided not to review the decision and also failed to draw the offside line despite agitations from Liverpool players, staff, and spectators.

When that incident happened, Liverpool was a man down as the visitors went on to have another player sent off and lost the game 2-1 with nine players.

On Sunday, PGMOL released a statement to describe the decision to rule out Luis Diaz’s goal as a “significant human error”. They also described the decision as a “clear and obvious factual error.”

In reaction to PGMOL’s acknowledgment of the error, Liverpool said, “Liverpool acknowledges PGMOL’s admission of their failures last night. The correct application of the laws of the game did not occur, resulting in sporting integrity being undermined.

“We fully accept the pressures that match officials work under but these pressures are supposed to be alleviated, not exacerbated, by the existence and implementation of VAR.

“It is therefore unsatisfactory that sufficient time was not afforded to allow the correct decision to be made and that there was no subsequent intervention.

“That such failings have already been categorized as ‘significant human error’ is also unacceptable. Any outcomes should be established only by the review and with full transparency.

“This is vital for the reliability of future decision-making as it applies to all clubs with learnings being used to make improvements to processes to ensure this kind of situation cannot occur again.

“In the meantime, we will explore the range of options available, given the clear need for escalation and resolution.”

Below are the 14 different games in which Premier League Match Officials made errors which PGMOL apologized for: