Manchester United’s controversial defeat to Manchester City has taken another dramatic turn after Pro Ref decided to stand down the VAR officials responsible for overturning the original decision to disallow Erling Haaland’s winning goal at Old Trafford.
The decision has intensified the debate surrounding the Manchester derby, with the refereeing controversy becoming almost as prominent as the result itself. Manchester City eventually secured a 1-0 victory despite playing more than 70 minutes with ten men, but Haaland’s decisive goal became the biggest talking point after the final whistle.
However, contrary to some reports circulating online, the official who has been stood down is not Michael Oliver. Oliver was the referee in the middle during the derby and initially ruled Haaland’s goal offside. The officials removed from the next round of Premier League appointments are VAR Matt Donohue and assistant VAR Blake Antrobus. Their availability will be reconsidered after the international break.
The controversy began in the second half when Manchester City launched an attack that eventually resulted in Haaland finding the back of the net. Oliver initially ruled the striker offside, apparently bringing an end to the attack.
VAR then intervened.
After reviewing the incident, Donohue determined that Haaland himself was in an onside position and recommended that the original decision be overturned. The goal was subsequently awarded, allowing City to take the lead at a crucial stage of the match.
The problem, according to Pro Ref, was not Haaland’s position.
Instead, the major issue was the involvement of Manchester City midfielder Enzo Fernández.
Fernández was in an offside position during the attacking move and made an attempt to play the ball. Although he did not ultimately touch it, his movement was considered relevant because of its potential impact on Manchester United’s defenders.
Pro Ref later acknowledged that VAR had failed to properly consider that aspect of the incident.
The refereeing body admitted that the VAR should have recommended an on-field review rather than simply overturning Oliver’s original decision.
The admission represented a significant development because it effectively confirmed that the controversy surrounding Haaland’s goal was not simply a disagreement between Manchester United and the officials.
Pro Ref itself accepted that an important mistake had been made.
According to the refereeing body’s explanation, Haaland was correctly determined to be onside, but the VAR failed to properly assess whether Fernández’s position and movement constituted interference with an opponent.
That distinction is crucial.
The controversy was therefore not simply about whether Haaland was behind the last defender. The question was whether Fernández’s offside position affected the ability of Manchester United’s players to defend the cross.
Lisandro Martínez was positioned close to Fernández during the attack, and the United defender subsequently argued that Fernández’s presence affected his ability to defend the situation.
Manchester United manager Michael Carrick was also highly critical of the decision immediately after the match.
Carrick questioned how Fernández could be considered not to have interfered with play when he had attempted to attack the ball in an area close to the United defence.
The United manager described the explanation as extremely difficult to understand and expressed frustration at the number of officials and technological checks involved in reaching what he believed was the wrong conclusion.
The subsequent Pro Ref admission gave Carrick’s post-match frustration additional significance.
Rather than simply defending the VAR decision, the organisation acknowledged that the officials should have taken another look at the incident.
Pro Ref also contacted Manchester United to acknowledge what it described as an “error of judgment.”
The decision to stand down Donohue and Antrobus was then taken by Pro Ref chief refereeing officer Howard Webb and his management team following a review of the weekend’s matches. Neither official was selected for the following round of Premier League fixtures.
Howard Webb subsequently provided further insight into what went wrong.
According to Webb, the VAR team suffered from what he described as “tunnel vision,” focusing on Haaland’s individual offside position without sufficiently considering the wider circumstances surrounding Fernández’s involvement in the attack.
That explanation is particularly significant because it highlights one of the fundamental difficulties surrounding VAR.
Technology can establish certain objective facts extremely accurately, such as the position of a player at the moment the ball is played. However, some aspects of the offside law still require an element of judgement.
Whether an offside player has interfered with an opponent can depend on the circumstances of the play.
That was precisely the issue at Old Trafford.
Haaland himself was not the player Pro Ref ultimately identified as the problem. The Norwegian striker was found to be onside after the VAR review.
Instead, the controversy centred on Fernández and whether his movement had an impact on the United defenders.
For Manchester United, however, that distinction offered little comfort.
The club had already suffered the consequences of the decision by the time Pro Ref acknowledged the mistake.
City’s goal changed the match.
United were unable to find an equaliser, and Manchester City left Old Trafford with all three points.
The result was particularly frustrating for United because City had been reduced to ten men during the first half following Phil Foden’s red card.
Oliver sent Foden off in the 23rd minute after the City forward kicked out at Bruno Fernandes. The red card was subsequently checked by VAR and confirmed.
That meant Manchester United had spent a considerable period of the derby playing against ten men, only to concede the decisive goal in controversial circumstances.
For City, the victory was extremely valuable.
For United, the manner of the defeat made the result considerably harder to accept.
The controversy has also created renewed discussion about the relationship between the on-field referee and VAR.
Oliver made the initial offside decision correctly based on what he saw during the live action. VAR then intervened and determined that Haaland was onside.
Under the current system, VAR is designed to correct clear and significant errors. However, Pro Ref’s subsequent admission effectively acknowledged that the review did not fully consider every relevant aspect of the attacking move.
That has raised questions about whether Oliver should have been given an opportunity to review the incident himself at the pitchside monitor.
Reports surrounding the incident have focused heavily on the fact that the final decision was made by VAR rather than Oliver after the original offside call.
Nevertheless, it is important to distinguish responsibility between the officials.
Michael Oliver was the referee who initially ruled Haaland offside.
The officials who overturned that decision were Donohue and Antrobus.
Therefore, describing the latest disciplinary action as a suspension of Oliver would be inaccurate.
The available reports instead show that the VAR team has been stood down.
That distinction matters because the controversy has already generated a huge amount of discussion among Manchester United supporters, Manchester City supporters and football commentators.
Pro Ref’s decision to remove the VAR officials from the next round of fixtures demonstrates how seriously the organisation viewed the mistake.
It also provides a clear indication that the incident will be used as part of the organisation’s internal review process.
The controversy is unlikely to disappear quickly.
Manchester United have already received an acknowledgement from Pro Ref, while the organisation has confirmed that the incident will be reviewed.
For Carrick and his players, however, the most frustrating reality is that an admission after the match cannot change the result.
Manchester City remain the winners of the derby.
Haaland’s goal remains on the scoreboard.
And United remain without the points they believed were within their reach after City were reduced to ten men.
The incident will therefore become another chapter in the increasingly complicated history of VAR in English football.
Technology was introduced to reduce major officiating mistakes, but the Haaland incident demonstrated that technology cannot completely eliminate subjective decisions.
Even when a system correctly determines one part of an incident, another element can still be missed.
That is exactly what Pro Ref says happened at Old Trafford.
The VAR correctly established that Haaland was onside, but failed to properly assess Fernández’s potential interference.
The result was a decision that Pro Ref itself subsequently acknowledged as an error of judgment.
For Manchester United supporters, that admission will provide some validation of their frustration, but it will not erase the disappointment of losing a Manchester derby in such circumstances.
For Manchester City, meanwhile, the controversy will inevitably remain attached to an important victory.
The biggest lesson from the incident may ultimately be that VAR decisions cannot be judged solely by the final frame or the position of one player.
Football is a fluid game involving several players, movements and interactions simultaneously.
At Old Trafford, the focus became Haaland’s position.
Pro Ref has now acknowledged that the officials should also have focused on Fernández.
That failure has cost two VAR officials their appointments for the next round of Premier League matches and has once again placed the spotlight firmly on the English game’s refereeing system.
And while Michael Oliver has not been suspended, the controversy surrounding his Manchester derby has become one of the most significant refereeing stories of the early Premier League season.