Chelsea’s red card was spot, plus more praise for Jon Moss in Mark Halsey’s Ref Review

In a weekend full of contentious decisions and questionable penalty claims, Mark Halsey has given us his two cents on the Premier League’s biggest referee calls of gameweek 5.

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Huddersfield Town vs Leicester City (Jon Moss)

I don’t think Huddersfield can have any complaints about the awarding of a penalty from Jon Moss, he’s got it right and he seems to be adding that consistency to this game now.

Watford vs Manchester City (Anthony Taylor)

A lot of the game wasn’t Anthony’s fault. Watford came up against a good City team – who looked awesome – but the assistant lost his concentration a couple of times.

That was out of the referee’s hands, he must go with his assistant and he can’t tell an offside. You have to look at the assistant, when you switch off that’s what happens. They weren’t difficult offsides, at that level you should be getting those rights.

You can argue Watford should have had a penalty, he gives the one at the other end but you can argue they’re both penalties. It wouldn’t have changed the game, but if it’s there to be given you have to give it.

West Brom vs West Ham (Paul Tierney)

I think Paul got the big decision spot on. It was a reckless challenge from Foster, but he wasn’t denying an obvious scoring opportunity because the play was going wide.

There were a number of defenders around, so it wasn’t a denial of a goalscoring opportunity, and it didn’t endanger the player’s safety with excessive force and brutality.

Foster has come out, he’s very, very low and if he was higher you could argue a red card should have been down, but I think Paul Tierney got it bang on.

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Tottenham Hotspur vs Swansea City (Mike Dean)

I felt Tottenham should have been awarded a penalty late on. Jordan Ayew caught Serge Aurier which has made the defender clip his own heels.

Dean signalled for a handball, but it’s hit him in the chest and went out. It was never a handball, it’s hit his chest because he was clipped by Ayew. I’m not sure what he was looking at but he’s got it wrong on both counts.

Chelsea vs Arsenal (Michael Oliver)

When you have these big games, there always seems to be a player sent off – and this time it was David Luiz. Overall, I thought Michael Oliver refereed the game well but the fault of some referees, including Michael, is the temperature goes up and the officials don’t slow it down.

You have all these challenges going in and the tempo goes up. If Oliver had slowed it down a bit more then maybe that doesn’t happen. I’d like to see him talk to players a bit more, you can’t blame him for Luiz’s challenge, but if he’d put his foot on the ball when the game stops and calmed the game down, it could have been avoided.

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You know as a referee which players need speaking to and I think Oliver currently lacks that little bit of experience of bringing the tempo back down. When the tempo goes up, players lose their heads and go into silly challenges.

I thought the initial caution for his overhead kick was very harsh, we want to see goals like that and not discourage them. The law states…

Playing in a dangerous manner is any action that while trying to play the ball threatens injury to someone, including the player themselves, and includes preventing a nearby opponent from playing the ball for fear of injury. A scissors/bicycle kick is permissible as long as it is not dangerous to an opponent.

Oliver deemed it dangerous but it’s not a caution, it’s too easy now to hide behind a yellow card. It was very harsh for an overhead bicycle kick, in law it is permissible and it doesn’t say it is a cautionable offence.

It wasn’t reckless and it wasn’t dangerous for the opponent. We’re once again off the pace with our recognition of careless and reckless. You have to ask what kind of coaching is going on at the top.

Manchester United vs Everton (Andre Marriner)

I thought Marriner refereed the game very well, thanks to his strong awareness and talking to players off the ball.

I think he got the two big shouts right, the handball was definitely a penalty but I didn’t think it was a penalty on Lingard. It was a tough decision, but I don’t believe any referee would be giving a penalty in that situation.

The only decision I had a problem with was his decision to caution Ashley Williams. I thought that wasn’t a caution, the official let challenges go that were worse and didn’t do anything about them.

Cuco Martina put in a worse challenge, which could have been a caution, so there was a lack of consistency. The only reckless challenge of the game was from Bailly and he deservedly got a caution, but I was disappointed by the Williams decision. The recognition of careless and reckless isn’t what it should be at this level, it’s becoming too easy for a referee to get out the yellow card.

Follow Mark on Twitter – @RefereeHalsey