Sorry isn’t good enough!
by Darren Deakin
Football supporters are used to debating decisions from the sidelines and their sofas, but what happens when the officials themselves admit they got it wrong?
In recent months, English football has seen a worrying string of high-profile errors, with the Professional Game Match Officials Limited (PGMOL, or Pro Ref) issuing apologies to club after club. Yet while the acknowledgment is welcome, it can’t undo the damage done on the pitch.
The list of contentious calls is growing. Last month, Manchester United received an apology from chief Howard Webb after VAR failed to spot Enzo Fernandez in an offside position during the build-up to Erling Haaland’s winner in the Manchester derby. The officials admitted the review was incomplete and a critical check was missed. Back in May, Nottingham Forest were told a handball should have ruled out a goal for Manchester United that ended their eight-game unbeaten run. Most memorably last season, Liverpool were left furious when Luis Diaz’s perfectly valid goal at Tottenham was wrongly disallowed, a “significant human error” Webb publicly apologised for, with the VAR team stood down from subsequent duties.
These are not marginal calls; they alter results, shift momentum, and change the complexion of entire seasons. These were just a small sample of too many mistakes.
The frustration is heightened because the technology exists to get these decisions right. VAR was meant to eliminate clear mistakes, yet instead we see process failures, delayed interventions, and inconsistent application of the rules. What good is a review system if those operating it cannot follow its own procedures?
Critics argue the culture around decision-making has become too hesitant, too inconsistent, and too cloudy. Rules, particularly on offside and handball, are applied differently from one match to the next, leaving players, managers and fans baffled. An apology after the fact acknowledges the mistake, but it does not recover lost points, restore confidence, or make amends to the supporters who travelled and invested in those matches.
Webb has spoken of improving transparency and accountability, and there have been steps in the right direction. But the frequency of these incidents suggests deeper, systemic issues that apologies alone cannot fix. If the game is to retain its integrity, the priority must be consistency, clarity, and a system that gets the big calls right first time, not one that simply says sorry afterwards when the damage has been done.
Apologies are a start. But people’s livelihoods are on the line too. What football needs now is action. Until the standard of refereeing and VAR operation matches the standards of the players on the pitch, the shadow of doubt will hang over every result.
