Game replayed, match-fixing after Nottingham Forest controversy

Tom Cavilla

After all the poor refereeing decisions involving Liverpool have been on the receiving end of this season, that this is the one people have chosen to kick up such a fuss over is rather amusing.

The Reds were told to take their medicine and ‘accept wrong calls are simply a part of the game’ after seeing a Luis Diaz goal at Tottenham Hotspur wrongly ruled out in September, yet that standpoint did not seem to apply on Saturday afternoon.

Tierney may have got this one wrong, by the letter of the law, but to suggest this drop-ball directly led to Liverpool scoring is completely false. The two moments were separated by almost two minutes, in which time Forest could have scored a goal of their own.

To see Mark Clattenburg release a statement on behalf of Forest after the game, in his new role of referee analyst for the Tricky Trees, only added to the hysteria.

I cannot remember when so much was made about an incident that would otherwise have not been noticed had Liverpool not gone on to score in the match. This was far from being a refereeing howler – you only have to look at what has gone wrong in other games this campaign to see that.

Richard Garnett

There’s nothing like a last-minute winner is there? Unless you’re on the receiving end. Tempers flared at the City Ground as the fuming home supporters were forced to digest a sickening defeat that kept Liverpool’s title charge firmly on course despite the obvious challenges of working with a threadbare squad.

All that anger has got to go somewhere hasn’t it? And in this case it was directed at Paul Tierney who’s botched drop ball restart is being blamed for a goal that happened almost two minutes later. Tierney is used to being berated by Liverpool fans after a number of run-ins with the Reds – and Jurgen Klopp – in the past, so it makes a change for the official to be public enemy number one somewhere else.

Liverpool were knocking on the door for a late match-winner well before Tierney’s indiscretion and although he got that particular call wrong, which is not too dissimilar to an incorrect throw-in call, Forest can have few complaints that Darwin Nunez eventually provided one. The real fury lies in how late it arrived, not that you will hear too many Liverpool supporters complaining.

If refereeing mistakes are supposed to level themselves out for teams over the course of a season then the Reds were certainly due one in Nottingham. That a glorious glancing headed manifested a few minutes later was simply quite a big bonus.

Jack Flintham

You can 100 per cent understand why Forest fans felt aggrieved at full-time at the City Ground. If this decision had gone against the Reds, you would likely feel the same way.

However, calls of corruption and insinuations of match-fixing are laughable and emblematic of the culture we find ourselves in, in 2024. Tierney quite clearly made an error and was not helped by a lack of support from his assistant officials.

But when it comes to the goal, surely Forest needs to be spending some time questioning how their team failed to clear the ball on numerous occasions before Nunez nodded in. Instead, they are opting to peddle wild conspiracy theories that the Premier League is attempting to gift Klopp his dream farewell, which is nothing short of farcical.

As the season progresses, teams have some good and some bad decisions go for and against them. On Saturday, it was Forest’s turn to feel aggrieved and who knows, this could balance itself out again next weekend, but unless we decide to hire robots to take control of officiating, we must allow for human error from our referees.

In this instance though, Liverpool’s winner was not a direct result of the drop ball controversy and deep down Forest know that too.

Tom Coley