Durhamfootman wrote: in fairness, I haven't seen it yet, so I was holding off before I commented, but yeah.... it was the first thing that passed through my mind when I saw the manner that Liverpool got back into, and then won, the game
French TV produced an amazing stat on this during the game. If you look at all the professional fouls given up to the Palace red card in the game, ie ones where you dont play the ball to kill an attack, Crystal Palace had committed 5 all roughly in the space between midfield and defence, and had received 3 yellow cards and one red card... Liverpool in the same area of the pitch committed 13 fouls of the same nature, and had not a single player booked. In the end, Liverpool ended up with far more fouls in the game, and more of the type of foul that drew the cards, but Palace had 9 players booked and 1 red card.... Liverpool had two players booked. Worth noting that the first Liverpool player was booked in the 99th minute, and that the referee didnt add the time he spent lecturing the players onto the additional time, so it magically helped Liverpool kill the game off.... not fishy at all after you spent 99 minutes refusing to book them. Worth noting too Trent Alexander Arnold did actually what Ayew was booked for (not retreating 10 yards) and obviously wasnt booked (he also last week did it, but kicked the ball away to waste time, and didnt get booked either).
This is the classic 2023 football debate though, isnt it? People will say that Endo was fouled, and Ayew should be booked, but its not really the point... its the fact that you get two different referees depending on which team is playing. If Endo is in a Palace shirt, thats a penalty. If thats Van Dijk with his 92nd clumsy break killing foul of the day, its not a yellow card. Its so frghtfully unfair and inconsistent, and so bloody blatant.