The legendary Brazilian playwright and sportswriter Nelson Rodrigues was not impressed with the advent of televised matches. “If the videotape shows it’s a penalty then all the worse for the videotape,” he once famously scoffed. “The videotape is stupid.”

One can only imagine what he would have made of video assistant referees. The Premier League glitterati certainly don’t approve.

Despite an attempt to implement a “light touch” this season, the English top-flight’s officials have been repeatedly guilty of heavy-handed interventions in the highest profile fixtures of this embryonic campaign. Howard Webb has already made his first groveling apology which has been swiftly rejected while the rest of the division are awaiting their own letters of explanation about a glut of other contentious incidents. The season, lest anyone forget, is just five games old.

Even at this stage of the campaign, the Premier League table would look a lot different had every referee taken the same approach as Rodrigues.

Premier League Table Without VAR

Manchester United lie at the center of the Premier League’s biggest VAR blunder since the mistakenly labeled “good process” which saw Luis Díaz’s onside goal for Liverpool against Tottenham Hotspur denied in 2023. As Webb, the head of the competition’s referee committee, has been forced to sheepishly admit in various mediums, Erling Haaland’s winner in the Manchester derby should not have been awarded by VAR.

The officials were blinded by “tunnel vision,” to use Webb’s excuse, and failed to spot that Enzo Fernández’s full-length leap in front of Lisandro Martínez could be construed as a deliberate interference with play from an offside player. VAR Matt Donohue instead became focused on finding that Haaland was in fact onside when he bundled the ball past Senne Lammens.

Yet, despite the impact of that goal, which condemned United to a humiliating defeat against City’s 10 men, Michael Carrick’s side would still be sat in 12th place even with the extra point.

Arsenal and Liverpool, by contrast, would be on the rise. The Gunners would benefit from Manchester City’s downfall while the Reds were denied a win against Nottingham Forest thanks to Florian Wirtz’s fairly disallowed offside goal.

Forest themselves would climb all the way up to 10th. Oliver Glasner’s new side has been denied an additional three points by the influential hand of VAR. Neco Williams had the only ‘goal’ of an otherwise scoreless draw with Tottenham Hotspur chalked off by VAR for an alleged handball while bundling into a 50-50 on the goal-line with Sandro Tonali.

The officials at Stockley Park were not shown a camera angle which definitively proved that Williams had handled the ball but still chalked the goal off—much to the fullback’s frustration. “Clear and obvious they say,” he sulked on social media after the match.

Just last weekend, Forest were again denied a goal which could have salvaged a point against Coventry City as Igor Jesus was deemed to have tripped up Caleb Yirenkyi before sliding the ball into the bottom corner. “Of course I have thoughts but I don’t want to speak about it again,” Glasner fumed.

Man City’s Offside Vindication

When the flag was raised after Haaland had smuggled the ball past Lammens at Old Trafford earlier this season he was momentarily confused. “I thought there was maybe someone who had flicked it, I don’t normally go offside,” he would later reflect. “I talked to [referee] Michael Oliver and I told him I took it personal that he thought I went offside.”

Haaland’s confidence in timing his runs was entirely justified. As the footage would show, City’s No. 9 had done his job, even if the VAR didn’t. This is no new occurrence. Despite constantly hanging on the shoulder of the last defender, Haaland has only been correctly flagged offside once all season.

Joško Gvardiol appears to have learned the same deceptive trait. On two separate occasions this season, the Croatian defender has forced an erroneous offside flag in the buildup to a goal. Unlike Haaland’s derby decider, both were right to be awarded. Gvardiol’s stoppage-time winner against Bournemouth set Enzo Maresca up for a perfect start which was taken into the international break by a bonkers win over Sunderland on Sunday, the last goal of which was set up by Gvardiol and scored by Haaland.

Without these retroactive offside reviews, City would be four points worse off and down in third rather than top of the table with an unblemished record. Yet, even Maresca is still arguing with the video tape, raging into the ether about supposedly incorrect decisions from three years ago.