'Awful' and 'grossly unfair' handball law to be kept despite VAR controversy

There are no immediate plans to change the “awful” and “grossly unfair” handball law that saw the Video Assistant Referee rule out goals by Harry Kane and Riyad Mahrez on Thursday night, Telegraph Sport has been told.

The law brought in last summer to penalise an attacking player for accidentally handling the ball in the build-up to a goal kept its place in the 2020-21 Laws of the Game which were signed off in March. Those laws came into force last month and were designed to remain in place until June 1 next year.

And although a temporary law change was approved in May to allow teams to make five substitutions when football restarted following the coronavirus crisis, sources told Telegraph Sport on Friday there are no plans for an emergency revision in respect of handball.

That is despite a growing backlash against the current law, which Telegraph Sport has been told is opposed by the Premier League and which Match of the Day host Gary Lineker has pleaded with the game’s lawmakers to “get rid of”.

He added on Twitter: “It’s hugely biased towards defenders. It’s grossly unfair. It’s disallowing far too many perfectly good goals. It’s putting VAR referees in an invidious position. Most of your law changes are great. This one is awful.”

Jermaine Jenas branded the disallowed Kane goal in Tottenham Hotspur’s 3-1 defeat at Sheffield United the “worst” instance in which VAR has been deployed this season.

The goal was chalked off after Lucas Moura was pushed to the ground by Sander Berge and, as he fell, the ball was smashed against his arm from point-blank range by John Egan before falling to Kane.

To compound the decision, referee Chris Kavanagh had played advantage for the push on Moura but mistakenly did not haul play back for a free-kick to Spurs, instead awarding one to United for the handball.

Jenas added: “No referee can sit across from me and tell me that’s a good decision for the game of football.”

Fellow Match of the Day pundit Alan Shearer said: “It’s shocking. Michael Oliver, the VAR referee, is sat at Stockley Park. He’s probably got his hands over his face thinking, ‘No, I cannot give that’. He must be embarrassed that he’s got to go back to Chris Kavanagh and say, ‘Unfortunately, you’ve got to disallow that goal.’ The law is awful.”

Spurs manager Jose Mourinho said after the match: “We’re going into a direction that’s really bad for the game, the beautiful game, that was the game that everybody fell in love with.”