Former referee explains Tottenham's Guglielmo Vicario incident against Brentford

During the second half of the victory over Brentford on Saturday, Spurs goalkeeper Guglielmo Vicario appeared to handle the ball outside of his penalty area, causing a lot of anger in the away end and on social media from Brentford fans, who feel aggrieved that the Spurs number one was not punished and have asked why VAR did not intervene after the referee had not spotted it in real-time.

Former Premier League referee of fourteen years Mark Halsey has explained that VAR could only have decided to intervene if the incident was seen as a clear and obvious error leading to a red card offence, and this particular case was not.

However, the former referee did suggest that this was a "loophole that had to be closed", and called upon current referees to use their judgement on whether incidents like this one constitute a denial of a goalscoring opportunity.

Former referee explains Tottenham's Guglielmo Vicario incident against Brentford

Halsey said: “The incident where keeper Guglielmo Vicario handled outside his penalty area was incorrectly dealt with by the match officials. But I do not believe that the Tottenham man, who was not punished, should have been sent off. In a situation like this, you have to consider whether it meets the criteria of denying a goal, or an obvious goal-scoring opportunity.

Referees must consider the distance between the offence and the goal, the general direction of play, the likelihood of an opponent keeping or gaining control of the ball, and the location and number of defenders. This did not meet those criteria.

It was handball, however, so it should have been a free-kick and a caution. VAR did not get involved because it was not a clear and obvious error regarding a red card offence. But it is a concern that referee John Brooks did not recognise the offence.”

This seems like a fair explanation from an experienced official. In any case, Vicario was fortunate to escape without a booking and a free-kick in a very dangerous area for the visitors, whilst the game was 2-1 and still very much in the balance.