Virgil van Dijk saw his goal disallowed for offside in Liverpool’s 2-0 defeat to Manchester City in the Premier League and Jamie Carragher believes the decision was incorrect
Former Liverpool defender Jamie Carragher says Virgil van Dijk’s equaliser against Manchester City should have been allowed to stand. The Reds skipper watched his strike get ruled out after officials decided Andy Robertson had interfered with play whilst in an offside position, unfairly affecting Gianluigi Donnarumma.
The goal would have drawn Liverpool level following Erling Haaland’s opener after thirty minutes. Arne Slot’s team were outplayed and underwhelming during the opening period against City, with the Dutchman’s header potentially offering an unexpected way back into the match.
Nevertheless it was deemed offside, leaving Liverpool’s player stunned, and just before the break, Nico Gonzalez’s deflected strike caught Giorgi Mamardashvili off guard to double the home side’s advantage. Gary Neville initially questioned whether the goal should have been disallowed, but Carragher strongly opposed the decision to rule out Liverpool’s equaliser.
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“This should have gone 1-1,” he said. “For me, it’s a goal.
“You maybe think you can see why it’s been given, you look at Andy Robertson’s position, is he impacting the goalkeeper? What a lot of people have looked at, when the ball comes to Van Dijk’s head, I can totally understand why that would be given as offside because Andy Robertson looks really close to the goalkeeper.
“Keep an eye on Donnarumma and where he shifts his weight, Donnarumma’s weight is going to his right, so he’s moving the opposite way, his foot has planted at exactly the time it goes over Andy Robertson’s head.
“That is the true moment we should be looking at, not when it leaves Van Dijk’s head, but when Robertson makes an action to get out of the way of the ball. Exactly [the duck is irrelevant], he can see everything, his initial movement to the right and he’s now diving full stretch.
“He’s not impacting him one bit. He’s already diving at full stretch for the header because he misreads it.
“He thinks the ball is going in the other side, he can see it clearly, Robertson getting out of the way of the ball, and you’ve mentioned the rules, it has absolutely no bearing on what happens here.”
Carragher also questioned how the decision was reached on the pitch. Slot pointed out that the ruling came 13 seconds after the ball found the back of the net with Van Dijk celebrating.
Referee Chris Kavanagh needed VAR to step in for the penalty call when Jeremy Doku was fouled by Mamardashvili, and Carragher reckoned the ideal approach would have been to let the video assistant intervene if there had been an offence.
Carragher added: “I don’t understand, Arne Slot mentioned it post-match, it took 13 seconds before the flag went up, so there’s obvious communication, why don’t they just let it go to VAR?
“The ball has gone in, you’re not quite sure, let VAR look at it. Thirteen seconds later they put the flag up, we talk about Man City getting a bit of luck for the Haaland goal, Liverpool have definitely been unlucky there but Man City were not lucky to win the game. They were streets ahead of Liverpool, especially in the first-half.”
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