And our referee explained the decision live after the VAR – at the Spartak match. Kirill Levnikov liked it

Spartak and Rostov started the friendly Winline RPL Winter Cup in the UAE – not the most spectacular match, without goals, but we will remember it from the premiere.

For the first time, a Russian judge explained live what he sees on the video replay and why he makes a specific decision.

How was everything? Levnikov reviewed his hand in the penalty area – and made sure that this was not a penalty

A few minutes before the final whistle, Spartak used a challenge – they called Kirill Levnikov to watch the moment with Danil Prutsev in the penalty area, they saw a chance for a penalty.

After a cross from Spartak, Pavel Bocharov from Rostov seems to have touched the ball with his hand.

Levnikov ran to the monitor, put on the headphones – and we immediately heard the entire conversation with the technicians who controlled the replays.

The referee asked for a tactical camera to see if there was contact between the ball and the hand, and then slow motion. “The hand goes to the support, then it automatically rises randomly. The game is unintentional – unpunished, ”Levnikov concluded. No penalties, as he showed initially.

“It turned out to be a show that everyone wanted to see,” the judge himself said with a smile to Dmitry Shnyakin. He liked this.

True, from the outside, not all reviews are delight. For example, Anatoly Sinyaev, a former judge and author of the Ale Ref telegram channel, sees a lot of problems here:

“It is obvious to me that at the monitor Levnikov understood that he was being heard, and thought more about an explanation than about the right decision,” he wrote in the channel . – Motivation of the moment. Yes, it’s better than the Club World Cup . ButThe decision was made very controversial. The explanation doesn’t fit the criteria.. Levnikov speaks about the supporting hand – but this is the one that is located between the body and the lawn and serves as a support. Here the hand spreads over the lawn and rises up. This is an unnatural position of the hand, the support here is not the hand, but the whole body of the player. Of course it’s a penalty.

Automatically rises up – is this according to the rules? Unintentional hand? Almost any hand in the box is unintentional. As often happens at the monitor, the judge is simply trying to find an excuse for what decision he made. And adjusts the moment for some kind of explanation. I would have appointed – I would also have explained why this is a penalty.

It is sad that this happened in the first big friendly match, which received a lot of publicity. Now the foggy brain of a fan will refer to this episode for some time. If we are talking about the openness of judges,you need to tell the public tomorrow or the day after tomorrow that this is a foul. Was in the first half of the season, is and will be. And that no new interpretations came out during the winter. Yes, it’s better to admit it now than later, in the official matches of the RPL at the same Spartak.