‘If I see that’ – What Dermot Gallagher had to say on three key incidents from Liverpool v Chelsea | OneFootball

Dermot Gallagher had no shortage of incidents to dissect from Liverpool’s win over Chelsea on Sunday.

The ex-Premier League referee made his usual Monday appearance on Sky Sports‘ Ref Watch to assess the major talking points from the weekend’s top-flight action, and there were several matters for discussion from the match at Anfield.

Gallagher reviews three big decisions

Firstly, Gallagher stated his reasons as to why he felt John Brooks was right to show Tosin Adarabioyo a yellow rather than a red card for impeding Diogo Jota when the Liverpool attacker seemed to have a clear run at goal, despite William Saliba being sent off in near-identical circumstances for Arsenal on Saturday:

“There are a number of things. Jota isn’t in possession of the ball. Direction of the ball, it’s going towards the corner flag. Distance from goal, it’s felt Colwill would have the chance to make up the ground. Too many variables.”

The former top-flight whistler then had his say on a possible penalty shout for Chelsea when Trent Alexander-Arnold caught Jadon Sancho in the box: “I didn’t think it was a foul. Both players are tangled. I’d be very surprised if that was given as a penalty.”

The third incident reviewed by Gallagher was the overturning of Brooks’ on-field decision to penalise Robert Sanchez for clattering into Curtis Jones, before VAR deemed that the Blues goalkeeper played the ball first:

“I think it’s a good intervention from VAR. If I see that as VAR, I think the goalkeeper has got the ball first, Jones has gone into him and it’s not a penalty. There’s going to be a collision.”

(Photo by Carl Recine/Getty Images)

Our verdict on those three decisions

Both Liverpool and Chelsea fans may be rolling their eyes at Gallagher agreeing with all three decisions, as ex-referees often tend to do, but let’s go through each incident to see if he has a point.

On Tosin impeding Jota, to us it’s very similar to what happened with Saliba and Evanilson on Saturday. If the Arsenal defender was sent off for his foul (which for us was the right call), then the Blues centre-back should also have walked.

With Trent on Sancho, we can see why Enzo Maresca was apoplectic over that call, as we likely would’ve been had it occurred the other way around. That’s one where, if Brooks had awarded the penalty, VAR probably wouldn’t have overturned it.

As for Sanchez and Jones, the Chelsea goalkeeper did get his foot to the ball, but the manner in which he charged into the Liverpool midfielder was still reckless, and we think he was fortunate to have the on-field decision reversed.

Both managers will feel they have legitimate grounds for complaint over certain incidents from yesterday, but thankfully the Reds produced a good enough performance to get over the line against a vastly improved Blues side.