Michael Carrick was quite rightly frustrated with Lisandro Martinez’s red card (Image: SKY SPORTS)
Michael Carrick was well within his rights to be angry following Lisandro Martinez’s ludicrous red card in Monday’s defeat to Leeds United. The defender was given his marching orders in the second half for pulling Dominic Calvert-Lewin’s hair as they battled for possession. It wasn’t even noticed as a foul by referee Paul Tierney, but he was quickly advised to go to the VAR monitor for an on-field review.
Martinez was ultimately sent off for violent conduct, leaving Manchester United a player short as they tried to get back into the match. They ended up on the wrong side of a 2-1 scoreline and Carrick was furious after the final whistle, describing the red card as ‘shocking’ and ‘one of the worst’ he had ever seen.
It’s hard to disagree with that assessment and it shows how far the game has fallen since VAR was introduced in the Premier League eight years ago.
As always, the technology isn’t the problem. It’s the sheer incompetence of the officials behind it who are simply re-refereeing the game from a dark room hundreds of miles away.
This is nothing new, though. We’ve come to accept terrible VAR decisions because they are so common, happening almost weekly.
In this instance, the main area of confusion relates to a hair pull being classified as ‘violent conduct’, which is just ludicrous in itself.
One of the problems with modern football is that everything is always so black and white. Applying these rules allows almost no room for nuance or interpretation.
Martinez was initially pushed in the face by Calvert-Lewin as they jostled for the ball, causing him to lose his balance, which was probably more of a foul than the red card itself.
However, the ultra-binary interpretation of the rules saw the Argentine dismissed in farcical fashion. I’d be confident in saying that nobody inside Old Trafford who saw that in real-time thought it was a clear red card.
Another game of football was overshadowed by a terrible VAR decision (Image: Getty)
When awful decisions like this take centre stage, you can’t just explain it away by saying ‘rules are rules’. It’s a ridiculous rule and because every incident is different, it should be changed to allow more room for interpretation.
Nobody goes to a game to watch the VAR show. They just want to see a game of football with the officials using common sense and applying the rules sensibly.
There are two main takeaways here. The first is that referees shouldn’t be pressured into making terrible decisions by somebody in a VAR room on the other side of the country, but that’s hardly a groundbreaking take.
The second is that restrictive rules, like a hair pull under any circumstances being classified as ‘violent conduct’, should be tweaked to allow for context when there are other factors at play, like Martinez being pushed in the face just seconds earlier.
These moments are ruining the game and something must be done to stop power-hungry officials from making it all about themselves. But that would rely on the Premier League actually applying some common sense, so don’t hold your breath.
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