Professional Game Match Officials chief, Howard Webb, has admitted that Myles Lewis-Skelly’s red card against Wolves was the wrong decision.
However, Webb has defended referee Michael Oliver and his officials, insisting the call was not a “horrendous” one.
Oliver controversially sent off Lewis-Skelly in the first half of the Gunners’ 1-0 win for fouling Matt Doherty.
After Arsenal submitted an appeal, the decision was eventually overturned.
But they were handed a £65,000 fine for their on-field reaction to the red card.
The latest episode of Match Official’s Mic’d Up, revealed that VAR Darren England opted not to send Oliver to the VAR monitor.
Webb said: “Clearly the referee on the day felt the actions of Myles Lewis-Skelly, he saw the player moving in towards an opponent without any ability or intention of playing the ball – with the intention of stopping the opponent. And the referee sees a raised foot make high contact and the opponent went down.
“The referee felt it was serious foul play, the VAR checked the footage to see if the call was clearly and obviously wrong and he felt it wasn’t – seeing that the contact was quite high up on the leg.
“But we know that for serious foul play, we need excessive force or brutality and what we see here is that high contact [just] glancing and coming off the leg quite quickly.”
