Why VAR intervened to rule out Scott McTominay's Manchester United goal vs Fulham

The decision to rule out a Scott McTominay goal for Manchester United against Fulham was made because the on-field referee needed to judge whether Harry Maguire was interfering with play or not.

The goal was ruled out after a VAR check which sent referee John Brooks to the monitor where he decided that Maguire, who had been in an offside position when the ball came into the box, was playing an active role in the move which ended with McTominay putting the ball in the net. Many United fans questioned the decision, claiming Maguire was not close to reaching the ball and was therefore not interfering in play.

But former Premier League official Dermot Gallagher praised the referee team at Craven Cottage for coming to the right decision. Speaking on Sky Sports Ref Watch he said: "Definitely [they made the right decision] and I think Sian Massey, the assistant VAR, should get a lot of praise for this as she is the specialist in that field and will have drawn it to the attention of Jarred Gillet (the VAR official).

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"When the ball comes in, you can see Maguire is in an offside position, which is not an offence. Does he attempt to play the ball? Most definitely because you can see he is not far from it. Does he impact on the defender? Most definitely because he can't play the ball as he is pinned off.

"Because it is not a factual offside and it is about all those factors, the referee has to go to the screen and make that decision. So a subjective offside."

Fortunately for the Reds, the goal did not impact the outcome as Bruno Fernandes scored late on to win the game for Erik ten Hag's team.

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