Premier League make late change to VAR official for Liverpool v Everton and Arsenal v Man City after huge mistake

John Brooks has been replaced as the VAR official for Liverpool v Everton and Arsenal v Manchester City following his huge mistake on Saturday.

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Brooks was the VAR official for Crystal Palace’s 1-1 draw with Brighton on the weekend and made a crucial error by disallowing a first-half Pervis Estupinan goal for offside, with the lines drawn incorrectly, as the Seagulls were forced to settle for a point against their rivals to damage their European qualification hopes.

Andre Marriner will now assume VAR duties for the Merseyside derby on Monday instead while David Coote will be the VAR official for the Gunners’ huge clash against Premier League title rivals City – after controversy in their draw with Brentford – which may have implications in the race for this season’s trophy.

Brentford’s equaliser against Arsenal in Saturday’s 1-1 result was only allowed to stand after VAR official Lee Mason also forgot to draw the lines that would have shown Christian Norgaard was offside in the build-up to Ivan Toney’s goal.

PGMOL (Professional Game Match Officials Limited) was forced to apologise to both Arsenal and Brighton following the weekend’s action.

‘PGMOL can confirm its Chief Refereeing Officer Howard Webb has contacted both Arsenal and Brighton & Hove Albion to acknowledge and explain the significant errors in the VAR process in their respective Premier League fixtures on Saturday,’ they said in a statement.

‘Both incidents, which were due to human error and related to the analysis of offside situations, are being thoroughly reviewed by PGMOL.’

<p lang=«en» dir=«ltr» xml:lang=«en»>Dermot Gallagher discusses Ivan Toney’s goal against Arsenal after a controversial VAR decision ð¤