Head of PGMOL calls controversial Champions League decision 'harsh' one year on from incident

Newcastle United returned to the Champions League last season for the first time in 20 years and their prize for doing so was a draw in the 'group of death'.

The Magpies were drawn alongside AC Milan, Borussia Dortmund and Paris Saint-Germain with hardly anyone giving Newcastle a prayer of getting out of the group.

And while Newcastle did struggle in a couple of games, Eddie Howe's men were in a position to qualify for the knock-out stages going into the final group game against PSG.

Newcastle had already shown that they had what it takes to go up against the big boys after battering PSG 4-1 at St James' Park, and they came close to picking up the three points they needed to progress in the competition as they headed towards full time with a one goal advantage until VAR struck.

Newcastle will always feel they were robbed that night in Paris

Paris Saint-Germain were awarded a penalty in the dying moments of the game after VAR judged that Tino Livramento had handled the ball. While the ball did strike Tino's arm, he knew absolutely nothing about it with the ball coming off his body and onto his arm.

Kylian Mbappe converted the penalty and Newcastle's Champions League dream came to an end.

The debate over the penalty award raged on for a while and has now surfaced again as the head of the PGMOL, Howard Webb brought up the incident in discussion on The Overlap.

Howard Webb has spoken of the changes to the handball rule in the Premier League

Webb brought up the incident as an example of a harsh decision that was made correctly due to the way the rules are written.

“The laws of the game say you can only be penalised for handball in a small number of circumstances. If you’re an attacker and the ball hits your arm and goes in immediately or goes to your foot and you score, that has to be penalised.

"For me, that is tough because the ball can be drilled at you, it’s going to hit your body anyway. VAR has to spend about a minute and a half looking at different angles – did it hit the arm, did it hit the body – that’s frustrating when the player knew nothing about it and didn’t really get an advantage. Still, we have to penalise it as that’s the way it’s written.

“The other ways are, if you deliberately handled the ball – such as Luis Suárez in the 2010 World Cup where he dips it over the bar – or if you make yourself unnaturally big in a way that is not justifiable. This year in the Premier League, we’ve given zero penalties for handball, and I can’t remember any controversy around handball this year.

"The reason that is because we consulted with clubs, we sent a survey out to every club, every captain in February or March, and the feedback was very clear – you give too many penalties that are not real penalties, that are not handballs. Players are just playing normally."

"If you think about [Mateo] Kovačić in the game at Chelsea against [Manchester] City, he goes to clear the ball, [his right arm comes up] and the ball gets drilled from close range onto his arm – we just waved it away.

“Now, in some other competitions, what they do is, they understand that making a judgement of natural and unjustifiable can be quite subjective. At some point, an arm can be too far away.

"What the governing bodies say is because there’s some subjectivity around a player making themselves big and making that judgement can be hard, the way your consistent is anytime your arm is away from your body and it blocks the ball, you’re going to get penalised. At least your consistent and players know what to expect.

“[We’ve changed that interpretation in the Premier League] because we’ve listened to the game, and we think we’re fine in the way that the law is written. We’ve said to the officials, only penalise when you form the professional judgement that the player has deliberately handled it, or even when the player has moved into the ball with their arm away – that is handball – or it’s just unjustifiable and they go to block a shot like this [arms fully stretched] and playing like a goalkeeper.

"But then you get situations like Newcastle [United] last year in Paris – that was a super harsh penalty. The ball came off a player’s body and onto his arm and they lost the game off the back of that.”

Thanks for closing the stable door after the horse has bolted, mate. Although this change only affects the Premier League and the Champions League decision would still be interpreted the same. How the same sport can have different rules depending on the competition is actually mental if you think about it.