Former Premier League referee Mark Halsey has questioned the decision to disallow Gabriel Martinelli's goal in Arsenal's 1-0 win over Everton on Sunday.
The Gunners maintained their unbeaten start to the Premier League season at Goodison Park thanks to a second-half Leandro Trossard strike, which also ended their five-game winless run against the Toffees.
Trossard was introduced in the first half for fellow winger Martinelli, who thought that he had curled home the opening goal in the 19th minute after being slipped through by Fabio Vieira.
Arsenal got a lucky break of the ball when Gabriel Magalhaes's sideways pass was intercepted by Beto, who inadvertently deflected the ball up the field to Eddie Nketiah.
The Englishman laid off Vieira to assist Martinelli, but he was coming back from an offside position when Beto's deflection - which was deemed unintentional - fell for him, and Martinelli's goal was disallowed following a VAR review.
However, the decision generated plenty of controversy due to the angles used by the VAR cameras, which Halsey - who refereed in the top flight from 1999 to 2013 - does not believe provided a conclusive view of the offside offence.
"Whether it is offside, a foul in the passage of play leading up to the goal or an accidental handball by the goalscorer — the VAR has to look at all aspects," Halsey told The Sun.
"It looked at the time that it might have been offside but, from the footage, it was not clear because the cameras did not appear as if they were parallel to the play."
Former Manchester United defender Gary Neville was also left bemused by the decision to rule out Martinelli's goal, having thought that Nketiah appeared onside from the naked eye.
"That's weird. Is there no better angle than that? Even I'm a little confused, he looked like he was well behind," Neville said while conducting punditry duties for Sky Sports News.
Martinelli's disallowed goal was not the only contentious VAR decision to have gone against Arsenal in 2023, as Brentford memorably came away from the Emirates with a 1-1 draw in February, despite Christian Norgaard being offside before Ivan Toney's equaliser.
It was subsequently revealed that VAR official Lee Mason had forgotten to draw the appropriate lines, leading to his resignation a few days later, and Arsenal received an apology from PGMOL chief Howard Webb.
On the other hand, Arsenal benefitted from a controversial offside call against Manchester United two weekends ago, as Alejandro Garnacho's strike - which would have put the Red Devils ahead - was chalked off before the Gunners scored two stoppage-time goals to win 3-1.
Gabriel appeared to catch Garnacho offside by the tiniest of margins, but an incensed Erik ten Hag insisted that the Argentine's strike should have stood and believed that the "wrong angle" was used by Jarred Gillett in Stockley Park.
While running through to score his disallowed goal on Sunday, Martinelli suffered a hamstring injury, and the Brazilian is now a doubt for Arsenal's upcoming clashes with PSV Eindhoven and Tottenham Hotspur. body check tags ::
