Panel Confirms No Penalty for Liverpool at Ipswich

The Premier League’s Key Match Incidents Panel has sided with the on-field officials over Liverpool’s penalty appeal at Ipswich Town earlier this month, ruling that the decision not to award a spot-kick was correct.

Liverpool were 2-0 up towards the end of the first half when Cody Gakpo burst towards the edge of the area and laid the ball off. As he did, Abdul Fatawu came sliding in to block and caught the Liverpool forward on the stretch, sending him to the turf right on the line of the box.

Referee Darren England waved play on. In the VAR room, Nick Hopton stuck with that call and chose not to send England to the monitor.

The incident has since gone under the microscope of the KMI Panel, the league’s independent body that reviews key decisions. Its members voted 4-1 that no penalty should have been given and unanimously – 5-0 – that VAR was right not to intervene.

“The majority feeling was that the contact was below the high threshold for a foul and they unanimously felt that this was not a clear and obvious error for VAR intervention,” the panel concluded.

Another tight penalty call, another layer added to the ongoing debate over what exactly constitutes that “high threshold” in the Premier League this season.