Howard Webb finally speaks out on Nottingham Forest vs Liverpool incident that caused big controversy

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Nottingham Forest have often been dissatisfied with referees’ and VAR’s decisionsthis season, and Howard Webb is about to rustle a few feathers with his opinion on one incident.

Nuno Espirito Santo and Nottingham Forest have become accustomed to FA charges in recent times, with Evangelos Marinakis even picking one up for his Brighton reaction.

The latest decision from the FA was over a social media post made by Forest and aimed at Stuart Attwell.

VAR decisions haven’t helped the mood around officials at the City Ground. Murillo was adjudged to have made a foul in the Fulham game, and Anthony Elanga’s claims for a penalty were ignored.

Fulham ended up taking all three points due to the penalty, which certainly didn’t help things.

Now, Howard Webb has spoken out on incident that involved Liverpool and Nottingham Forest this season, which caused big controversy at the time.

Howard Webb speaks out on Liverpool vs Nottingham Forest incident

Howard Webb is always in the news with a VAR issue seeming to happen almost every week.

Nottingham Forest got the better of Liverpool earlier on this season at Anfield, in what was a 1-0 win thanks to Callum Hudson-Odoi’s goal.

However, there was an incident in that game towards the end of the match which caused big controversy, as Dominik Szoboszlai wasn’t punished for kicking the ball away whilst on a yellow card.

Interestingly, Howard Webb has now come out and offered his opinion on that incident.

Speaking on the Overlap, he said this.

“There was a comparison made a couple of weeks ago between what Trossard did in the City vs Arsenal game and what um Szoboszlai did in the Liverpool vs Forest game.

“They’re really incomparable in terms of the impact because one happened on a freekick to Man City in an attacking area in added time at the end of the first half, and Trossard kicking the ball away prevented City from even being able to think about restarting the game quickly.

“I’m sure they would have wanted to, um, or at least have the option to. I think it was 2-1 at the time I think to Arsenal yeah.

“In the other one Liverpool down at home to Forest 1 nil and it’s in 90 plus four minutes. There’s a offside given or a foul given against Liverpool, and Szoboszlai in frustration kicks the ball across the penalty area, which wastes his own time.

“You know um it would be crazy if we cautioned him at that point. Why would we caution him at that point for kicking the ball away when Forest said thanks a lot yeah, it’s like you’re doing our job for us.

“Here we’d be seen as being totally out of touch with the game in that situation whereas the other one was impactful on City being able to restart the game.

“So because there was players there ready to restart in this situation, there were no Forest players there, they wouldn’t have restarted quickly anyway you know. To have some kind of have some understanding of the game so that made total sense to me and I’m sure it does to you.”

Consistency is missing in the Premier League with VAR and referees

Of course, the Leandro Trossard incident for Arsenal against Brighton was rightfully a yellow card when you take the rules into consideration.

However, not giving Szoboszlai a yellow card for kicking the ball away is nonsense, as no matter the situation or time, players should be punished for that behaviour.

There are rules in place for a reason, and when you start to tinker with them for certain situations, everything just complicates.