MARCUS RASHFORD’S decisive goal against Liverpool WAS offside – but there’s an excellent reason why it was still given.
Erik ten Hag’s side were 1-0 up through a Jadon Sancho strike when Anthony Martial played a through ball into the path of a sprinting Rashford.
The 24-year-old slotted the ball past Alisson to score and after a VAR check for offside the goal was given.
However he was only deemed onside because of a change in the tolerance level which was adjusted last summer.
Because of the flaw in VAR of never knowing exactly when the ball was played and the manual plotting of lines coming off the body, a new system was proposed to benefit attacking sides.
The aim is to get rid of the so called ‘toenail’ or ‘pixel’ offsides.
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If the two lines – one off the attacker and one off the defender – are touching then it is ruled too close to call.
As a result, the benefit of the doubt is handed to the goal scoring team and their should be a green line drawn off the defender to show it was one of those decisions.
In the still provided by VAR there is a green line off Liverpool centre-back Joe Gomez meaning Rashford was actually just offside – but a benefit of the doubt choice was made to award the goal.
Back in the 2020/21 season the goal would not have been chalked off.
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Man Utd won’t care now though as they secured a 2-1 win and a vital three points to firmly put the Brentford humiliation behind them and put Liverpool in trouble.
Last season’s Champions League finalist have taken just two points in their opening three games meaning they are five behind Manchester City and seven off Arsenal already.
However a supercomputer still thinks Liverpool will finish in 2nd and United to finish in 6th.
Source: Soccer - thesun.co.uk
