Howard Webb dissects key decision in Spurs v Newcastle United match | OneFootball

Howard Webb, PGMOL and the Premier League have opened up discussions between the referee and the Video Assistant Referee (VAR) for key incidents this season.

In this latest instalment of “Match Officials Mic’d Up” in 2024/25, Howard Webb, chief operating officer at PGMOL, the organisation that oversees the League’s match officials, has discussed a number of recent incidents.

The idea is to go through the conversations between the match officials to give fans a greater knowledge of how decisions are made.

The officials on the pitch do not hear all the conversations from the VAR hub in Stockley Park.

Amongst the recent incidents that Howard Webb has dissected, is one key one involving Newcastle United, from last Saturday at Tottenham.

Premier League report on Howard Webb looking at the Anthony Gordon goal on Saturday, Newcastle defeating Tottenham 2-1  – 7 January 2025:

In the build-up to Newcastle United’s equaliser against Tottenham Hotspur, the ball struck the hand of Joelinton before it fell into the path of Bruno Guimaraes, who slid in Anthony Gordon to score.

What the match officials did:

Referee Andy Madley recognised that the ball hit Joelinton’s hand, but believed it was accidental as his arm was by his side and was in a natural position. He let play carry on and Newcastle went on to score. After review, VAR official Chris Kavanagh backed up Madley and confirmed his on-field decision to award the goal.

Webb:

“There’s no doubt, the ball does strike Joelinton’s hand. And then the goal is scored fairly quickly afterwards. But Joelinton doesn’t score the goal. The ball goes to Guimaraes I believe and then it goes to Gordon, who scores.

“Of course, we can only penalise handball in certain circumstances. Not every contact with the hand or arm on the ball is something we would penalise.

“We see this situation and the VAR describes it really well. Joelinton’s arm [is] in a really normal position as he’s moving and then when the ball does strike him from quite close range, it’s down by his side. The ball hits the arm and then ricochets off.

“He doesn’t move the arm in the direction of the ball. The arm is moving naturally. He doesn’t, importantly, make himself unnaturally bigger. His arm is close to his body so that’s not a handball offence. He wouldn’t be penalised with a penalty [against him] if he did that in his own penalty area.

“The only time he’d ever be penalised for that is if he scored immediately from that contact or if it [the ball] went directly in off that particular arm but that’s not what happens here. So we agree it’s not a handball offence.

“Tottenham might feel unlucky [because of] the way the ricochet played out and the goal was scored. But the laws of the game stipulate quite clearly that position isn’t something that you would penalise.”