John Terry surprisingly takes Arsenal side with fuming verdict on William Saliba Chelsea debate

John Terry has labelled the decision to award Chelsea a penalty against Arsenal «harsh» after William Saliba handled a Mykhailo Mudryk header. The Blues came flying out of the blocks at Stamford Bridge in a London derby with Enzo Fernandez firing over early on after Conor Gallagher saw a close-range effort blocked.

After a quarter of an hour, Chelsea were then handed a golden chance to take the lead after VAR recommended Chris Kavanagh to have a look at the pitchside monitor. The incident came when Mudryk met a Raheem Sterling cross ahead of Saliba with his header catching the stray arm of the Frenchman and thus a penalty was given which was then converted by Cole Palmer.

Liverpool saw a similar penalty awarded in their Merseyside Derby win over Everton with Michael Keane as the player handling the ball. The hand ball rule has changed on numerous occasions in recent years with it still unclear to some what actually constitutes an offence with the current wording from the FA and PGMOL saying as follows:

«It is an offence if a player touches the ball with their hand/arm when it has made their body unnaturally bigger. A player is considered to have made their body unnaturally bigger when the position of their hand/arm is not a consequence of, or justifiable by, the player’s body movement for that specific situation. By having their hand/arm in such a position, the player takes a risk of their hand/arm being hit by the ball and being penalised.»

Despite Saliba going up for a header, which usually leads to both arms coming away from the body in an attempt to gain momentum and height, a penalty was still given. Chelsea legend Terry has now commented on the penalty with his verdict sympathising with Saliba.

On X (formerly Twitter),