FA Cup: VAR ‘shambles’ overshadow Chelsea shoot-out victory

Chelsea 1 Norwich City 1 (Chelsea win 5-3 on penalties)

Chelsea advanced to the fourth round of the FA Cup last night win a penalty shootout win over Norwich but only after a video refereeing controversy that Alan Shearer described as a “shambles”.

The BBC pundit fired his broadside at the new video review system on Match of the Day after a replay was shown of Timm Klose’s challenge on Willian, the upshot of which was a booking for the Chelsea player for diving.

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Replays showed clear contact between the pair, and yet video official Mike Jones didn’t query the initial decision of pitch referee Graham Scott.

The incident came in extra-time, one of several contentious moments in a frenetic match, that ended with Chelsea down to nine men after the dismissals of Pedro and Alvaro Morata.

Michy Batshuayi put Chelsea in front on 55 minutes when he tapped home Kenedy’s cross but Norwich levelled when Jamal Lewis headed Klose’s cross into the Blues net in stoppage time.

That’s when the drama really began with Pedro receiving his marching orders on 117 minutes and Morata following him down the tunnel three minutes later, the pair dismissed for two bookable offences.

As it turned out the only missed penalty from the shootout was Norwich’s first, the effort of Nelson Oliveira saved by Willy Caballero, and it was left to Eden Hazard to stroke home the decisive spot-kick.

Chelsea now face Newcastle in the next round of the FA Cup but the main talking point last night was the failure of the VAR to pick up the foul on Willian.

“We need to improve if we want to use this new system,” said Chelsea manager Antonio Conte. “There was a very clear situation with Willian at the start of extra-time. I watched it again and this is a very clear penalty… [it] was a big, big mistake, not of the referee on the pitch but the one watching on the TV.”

Conte pointed to how Italian football uses VAR and questioned whether the system has been introduced into England before the officials have fully understood its capabilities.

“In Italy we have been using this system for six months and I think you can reduce a lot of the referees’ mistakes,” he said. “Before using this new system, they tried and tried it. When you introduce a new system, you need a bit of time before finding the best way of using it. It is not right if the referee doesn’t go to watch a doubtful situation because the final decision is for the referee on the pitch.”

Relief at the win - Chelsea’s first of the year in any competition - was the overriding emotion for Conte but he expressed concern that the match had left his squad with little time to prepare for Saturday’s trip to the south coast.

“We have to play in two days against Brighton at 12.30pm,” he said. “I hope we don’t pay, also because my decision was clear: to try to go to the next round and give a bit of rest to the other players.

“For sure we have to face many problems, and also because Pedro and Morata are not able to play, but we want to try to get three points.”