Aston Villa boss Unai Emery blasts referees insisting they are NOT using VAR ‘enough and correctly’ after Jhon Duran’s red against Newcastle
- Emery has used his programme notes ahead of Brighton clash to question VAR
- Villa’s appeal against Duran red was dismissed and his three-match ban upheld
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Unai Emery has accused referees’ chiefs of using VAR to protect officials’ reputations rather than ensuring they make the right decisions.
Aston Villa are furious at two recent incidents: the failure to award Morgan Rogers a penalty in the 2-1 defeat at Nottingham Forest on December 14, and the straight red card shown to Jhon Duran in the 3-0 loss at Newcastle on Boxing Day.
Villa’s appeal against the Duran decision was dismissed and his three-match ban upheld.
Now Emery – who has rarely criticised officials during his time at Villa – has used his programme notes ahead of Monday’s clash with Brighton to question whether VAR is being deployed in the right way.
‘In our opinion, the referees are not using enough and correctly the VAR,’ he said. ‘The Video Assistant Referee came to help us avoid injustice or mistakes, and if we use it to protect a certain way of understanding the refereeing of football or just to protect whatever it takes for the on-field decisions to be delivered – right or wrong – by the referee.
‘If we start to use the VAR in a political way, we are forgetting that the video tool is here to protect mainly the game and the fairness of the competition.
Unai Emery has accused referees’ chiefs of using VAR to protect officials’ reputations
Villa’s appeal against Jhon Duran’s red was dismissed and his three-match ban upheld
‘VAR is not a tool to protect or to be under any ego, any system or any individual. VAR cannot be overused to break the spirit of the game but if it is existing and available, VAR neither must be underused on purpose and let big mistakes happen without using all the tools correctly.’
For the 2024/25 campaign, the Premier League introduced a higher threshold for VAR intervention, which they labelled ‘Referee’s Call.’
The idea was that VAR would question the on-field official only if the decision was ‘clearly and obviously wrong’. In the eyes of the officials, neither the Rogers nor Duran call fell into that category.
Emery added: ‘I decided to write these lines with the spirit of constructive reflection. Referees are under high pressure with an extremely difficult task. I respect every one as a professional and human being and nothing disappoints me more when I read stories about incidents or harassment of young referees in lower levels of the game.’
