Report: “I made a wrong VAR decision over Cucurrella’s hair pull by Christian Romero” – Mike Dean admits blames

Mike Dean, who was in charge of the VAR decision, failed in all ways, especially, bridging the rules guiding the use of the VAR, which lead to the controversies at Stamford Bridge, decided against any punishment for Christian Romero at the time, he pull Cucurrella’s hair.

Tottenham Hotspur striker, Harry Kane corner for a stoppage-time leveller to deny Chelsea victory and spark ugly touchline clashes between the rival benches.

In his Daily Mail column,

Mike Dean admitted:

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“No referee wants to be driving home from a game knowing they should have made a different call. Sometimes in hindsight, you realise you could have acted differently.

“For the second goal by Harry Kane, I asked referee Anthony Taylor to wait while I looked at the incident involving Tottenham’s Cristian Romero and Chelsea’s Marc Cucurella.

“I could not award a free-kick as VAR, but I could recommend to Taylor that he visit the referee review area to consider a possible red card. In the few seconds I had to study Romero pulling Cucurella’s hair, I didn’t deem it a violent act.

“I’ve since studied the footage, spoken to other referees and, upon reflection, I should have asked Taylor to visit his pitch-side monitor to take a look for himself. The referee on field always has the final say.

“It goes to show that no matter how experienced you are, and I’ve spent more than two decades as a Premier League official, you are always learning.

“It’s disappointing for me as this was one incident in an otherwise very good weekend from our officials.”