Within the weird fallout of Liverpool’s late 1-0 win at Nottingham Forest, it has been erroneously claimed that Paul Tierney was demoted from refereeing obligation.
The furore over Tierney’s failure at hand a drop ball to Forest following a head harm to Ibrahima Konate – minutes earlier than Darwin Nunez‘s 99th-minute winner – has been spectacular.
Ex-referee Mike Dean described the error as “monumental” whereas chatting with Sky Sports activities, whereas Mark Clattenburg, who now serves as Forest’s referee analyst, has labored to maintain the choice within the highlight.
In actuality, it was a lapse as frequent as awarding the mistaken facet a throw-in, or signalling for a purpose kick moderately than a nook.
The actual, monumental error was in not even awarding a free-kick for Ryan Yates’ studs planting on the facet of Ibrahima Konate‘s head.
Tierney had already wrongly given Forest a drop ball for a earlier incident within the recreation, however that has largely been ignored in favour of headline-grabbing conspiracy theories.
It has since been reported by quite a few shops that Tierney had been ‘dropped’ from refereeing duties for the upcoming weekend in consequence.
The Occasions, for instance, worded their headline to assert that the 43-year-old had been “switched” to VAR for Arsenal vs. Brentford on Saturday, inferring that he had initially been slated to work as a referee.
That has, in fact, gained traction on social media, with the favored line being that Tierney had been demoted for his error.
However it’s extensively reported, together with inside Martyn Ziegler’s piece for the Occasions itself, that PGMOL will not be viewing the appointment as a punishment.
As an alternative, as Ziegler explains, Tierney is solely “amongst a gaggle of officers who often alternate between being referees and VARs.”
The final matchweek during which he was not chosen as a referee was in mid-February – the week of Liverpool’s 3-1 win over Burnley – when he was as an alternative VAR for Luton vs. Sheffield United.
Tierney typically pulls double obligation over a spherical of fixtures, however this matchweek would be the tenth time of 28 (35.7%) this season during which he has not been chosen as referee.
Twice he has not been concerned in any capability, whereas he’s most frequently used as a VAR if not appointed for refereeing duties – and sometimes as fourth official.
Whereas it may well definitely be argued that referees ought to face punishment extra typically than the PGMOL seem to decide on to take action, this isn’t a kind of cases.
Both means, to recommend that Tierney had purposely favoured Liverpool given his historical past of run-ins with Jurgen Klopp – together with through the Forest recreation itself – could be ridiculous.
