Standard lost 0-1 to Charleroi. In the box, Salieu Drammeh had his foot trodden on. No penalty. VAR asked for nothing.
Radja Nainggolan summed up his astonishment, in Dutch: “Even Botticelli can see this, you know.” Botticelli. A painter from Florence. Dead for more than five centuries. I note that he is now cited to tell a foot from a stud. In 1980, we cited the referee. I’m not criticising. I’m noting that the standard of reference has gone up.
Jonathan Lardot, head of the Belgian referees, judged afterwards that Standard should have had that penalty. The contact was clear enough to intervene, he said. So there were three people in front of a screen during the match, and the right answer arrived afterwards. A weekly paper does the same. It costs less.
Stijn Stijnen would like more former footballers on VAR. Olivier Deschacht sees a problem, because of their past at Anderlecht or Club Brugge. Let me sum up. We invented a machine so as to stop depending on one man. And now we look for which men to put in the machine. Note that I’m not against progress. I’m against this progress.
Deschacht also demands the suspension of the three officials involved. Three suspensions for one foot. At the Heysel, we had one referee, two linesmen, and when it was missed, it was missed for everyone at the same time. We went home. We talked about it at the chip shop. Nobody asked a painter for his opinion.
Me, I’d put Botticelli on the right wing. When we’ve got eleven, that is.
I’ll reread all of this on Monday, in my paper. The score will still be 0-1. Well. It’s the times.
It’s true, we checked: Voetbalkrant.
