There has been an abundance of major referee errors this century, and we picked out our top five most controversial decisions made by those in the middle since 2000.
With the introduction of VAR, the blushes have been spared slightly for referee’s, however there still seems to be plenty of controversy that is caused by the new technology.
It has recently been announced that there will be semi-automated offside system in place in the Premier League next term, in hope that there will be a limited amount of error and the correct decision will be made more frequently.
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Simunic triple yellow
Graham Poll made a disastrous error in the 2006 World Cup when he showed Croatian defender Josip Simunic a third yellow card, not realising that he already been booked twice.
The English referee was sent home soon after the monumental error, despite being in contention to be given to nod for the World Cup final that year.
AFCON referee stops game early
Arguably the most controversial of them all, Zambian referee Janny Sikazwe blew for full-time in the 85th minute in an AFCON 2021 match, and then again in the 89th minute of the game.
On the second occasion, the players returned to the changing room and it has since been announced that Sikazwe was suffering from dehydration during the match and completely lost concentration.
West Brom penalty
The most recent error on our list was in a Championship match earlier this week, when West Bromwich Albion were given a controversial penalty, for a handball that was clearly outside the box.
If there was VAR involved, then it would have almost certainly been overturned, and although this was a massive mistake from the ref, Rotherham had already been relegated meaning that they were not too disheartened by the mistake.
Mistaken Gibbs red card
Chelsea found themselves two goals ahead against Arsenal at Stamford Bridge in 2014, and things when back to worse when Arsenal were shown a red card.
However, the controversy was that Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain was the man who stopped a shot in the box with hand and referee Andre Marriner showed Kieran Gibbs the red card, a real disaster from the now retired Marriner.
Ben Thatcher avoids red
Manchester City defender Ben Thatcher brutally flattened Bruno Mendes with his elbow which left the Portuguese defender needing oxygen back in a Premier League fixture in 2006.
The ‘foul’ was not deemed to be a red card at the time by the referee, but it was later decided by the FA that Thatcher would be sidelined for eight games due to the dangerous nature of his challenge.
