Anger was rife in the stands of the Pierre-Mauroy stadium on the night of Sunday, September 1. Olivier Létang and Bruno Genesio, respectively president and coach of Losc, took turns railing against video refereeing in front of the press.
Their team had just lost 3-1 to Paris Saint-Germain. But a move in the 82nd minute changed the course of the match. At that moment, Zhegrova had just deceived Donnarumma with a long-range shot, the score was 2-1. In the process, the Kosovar took a free kick, deflected by André’s head and extended by Meunier to Tiago Santos, who only had to finish. The northern crowd got excited then died down when the VAR intervened and signaled an offside position for the Portuguese.
Based on the first images released, Olivier Létang is convinced that this goal was valid. “I even went to see Mr. Bastien, who had nothing to do with it but who confirmed to me the fact that Thomas Meunier touched the ball, it put Tiago Santos back into play,” he revealed. “On the bus, what were the referees doing, were they watching something else, a film?”, Bruno Genesio quipped bitterly.
“Too hasty treatment”
According to the French Football Federation’s Refereeing Department, the VAR’s decision was ultimately entirely fair. Information revealed by Le Parisien, which RMC Sport is able to confirm. Indeed, new images attest to Tiago Santos’ offside position at the time of Benjamin André’s header, then at the time of Thomas Meunier’s service.
“We wanted to review the images by reprocessing them as they should have been during the match,” Amaury Delerue, manager-instructor of Ligue 1 referees, told our colleagues.
It appears that the VAR did indeed make a mistake by failing to notice Thomas Meunier’s deflection. But this error has no impact on the score since the goal was not valid.
The referee manager-instructor assures that “there was too hasty treatment on the part of the video assistant, who did not take into account Meunier’s deviation on the trajectory of the ball. It creates a new situation of reading offside, so the VAR process was not respected until the end at time T”.
Referees summoned after the match
Amaury Delerue intends to draw conclusions from this imbroglio. He has called together all the match referees, with the aim of making each of them aware of the “difficult to read” situations and inviting them to take their time to ensure that the right decision is made.
The former Ligue 1 referee also plans to meet Bruno Genesio to explain to him the reasons for the cancellation of Tiago Santos’ equaliser.
At this stage, neither the Lille coach nor Olivier Létang have reacted since the broadcast of the new images revealed by the DA.
- RMC Sport
