‘Absolute disgrace’ – Daryl Burgess fumes over controversial incident in WBA clash v Villa
Former West Brom defender Daryl Burgess has blasted Martin Atkinson after the referee sent off Jake Livermore in Sunday’s game against Aston Villa.
The Baggies captain initially received a yellow card after he lunged into a challenge with Jack Grealish but after Atkinson consulted the pitch-side VAR monitor the punishment was upgraded.
This is yet another occasion this season where Albion have been on the wrong end of a VAR call and Burgess took to Twitter to heavily criticise the decision.
Burgess tweeted, “That is an absolute disgrace! The referee has bottled it completely! I have never seen a ref look at the screen & stick to their original decision!
“If VAR has improved football please explain to me how? I honestly do not believe it was even a booking.”
The assertion that Livermore’s challenge wasn’t a foul is perhaps a bit extreme but Burgess has a point about referees looking at the pitch-side monitor.
It is incredibly rare that the referee sticks with their original decision after looking at the VAR monitor and this has been the case with Albion’s VAR experience this season.
At Old Trafford, David Coote overturned his decision to award the Baggies a spot kick after looking at the monitor despite it looking like a stonewall penalty.
More recently, Paul Tierney sent off Matheus Pereira in the Baggies’ game against Crystal Palace after initially giving a yellow card to the winger for his collision with Patrick van Aanholt.
It does seem that referees are certain to change their decision if they are instructed to look at the pitch-side monitor as the men with the whistle seem to be ruled by slowed-down video replays instead of their own opinions.
West Brom have seen the worst of VAR this season and there is little doubt that the red card impacted the result of Sunday’s Midlands derby.
Many Albion fans will have shared the opinion of one of their former players as the question over whether VAR is improving football is back on the agenda.
In other West Brom news, Baggies fans tore one player to shreds after their poor performance against the Villains.
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