Former Premier League referee Dermot Gallagher has suggested that VAR's scope to influence matches could be changed after Arsenal's equalising goal against Tottenham on Wednesday night. Mikel Arteta's side drew level in the first half thanks to a Dominic Solanke own goal that came from a corner that should not have been given.

Referee Simon Hooper awarded the Gunners a set piece after Pedro Porro was judged to have been the last player to touch the ball during a battle with Leandro Trossard. The Spurs full-back was furious when Hooper indicated for a corner, and his fears were proven true when Gabriel Magalhaes met Declan Rice's cross to the far post, heading into Solanke to make it 1-1 at the Emirates Stadium.

As the strongest set piece side in the Premier League, Arsenal certainly made their visitors pay. Despite access to cameras and angles showing that the ball rebounded off Trossard, Hooper was left helpless to change his decision.

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Gallagher, speaking on Sky Sports' Ref Watch, accepts that a mistake was made but also explained that it wasn't possible for the call to be overturned. "I think this is a real shame because this is all about consequences," he said. "You know, [the] referee makes a decision.

"Where he is on the field he doesn't see it strike Trossard but it definitely does, there's no doubt about that. He gets the last touch, it should be a goal kick.

"The corner comes across, if it gets knocked out of play we don't talk about it but it goes in the net so suddenly the consequences are ramped up. VAR can't award anything other than red cards, penalties, goals, mistaken identify. It can't do restarts so it's out of their remit at the moment. Whether that will come in years to come, I don't know."

When asked if the VAR system in place will change to stop errors like this from happening, Gallagher added: "I think it's inevitable that it will evolve, it will get different. Where I think people accept it evolving is factual decisions. No doubt about it that was factual.

"Whether that will be in the future [and] they will say, well, if that is spotted it would be flagged up and someone can say to Simon, 'this has rebounded off his leg.' For Simon Hooper he may well have felt that when it hit Trossard he was actually off the pitch. I don't know. He wasn't, he was on the pitch. There's no doubt about it. It's a factual decision."

The impact went on to be profound as Trossard himself put Arsenal in front just minutes later to complete a turnaround. Despite rallying late on, Spurs weren't able to end a run of five games without a win. They have picked up just one point in that time and are only seven points off the bottom three.

Just a few weeks after lamenting the referees indirectly for their role in a 2-1 loss to Newcastle United, Ange Postecoglou was more disappointed with his team's performance than the officials. "Well it did [impact the game]," he admitted afterwards. "It did but I don’t want to talk about referees. I have got to take responsibility for my team and I let the referees take responsibility for theirs.

"It wasn’t a corner. It’s how things are going for us at the moment. But that aside, we weren’t anywhere near the level we needed to be in that first half in such a big game. We have got to understand that what we can control is the first thing we need to focus on."

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