I wasn’t livid about the goal being called off but I’d have lost my mind if they took away the goal for Haaland playing the ball. Alisson never had it, that would have been idiotic.
The problem with his 50/50 standard was highlighted by the Fabinho call. He had clearly set a standard of allowing a very physical match. In the abstract what Haaland did is clearly a foul but in the context of the actual match that kind of stuff was being let go for both sides all over the place. Then there’s a goal and an entirely new standard is retrospectively adopted and the goal is called off. It’s just an absolutely untenable way to allow a match to proceed in regards to viewership. Yesterday we City fans suffered but it could just as easily have been Liverpool having a goal ruled off for some physical play in the build up — it was that kind of match and that kind of match is fine, maybe even great, but you have to somehow hold that standard when you go to Var and then the absurdity is too high. You’d have to ask everyone watching to not see the blatant grab and tug and ignore it. Which is yet another reason to bin Var imo or to stop reviewing for fouls in the build up. It creates too many weird and lawyerly situations and the sport suffers for this constant problem of goals not being goals. It’s anathema to the enjoyment of the sport that when that ball goes in I’m stopping my kids from celebrating because I know it’s going to var review