With four minutes and sixteen seconds left on the clock, England international Phil Roper taps the ball into keeper Maurits Visser’s goal. It seems to be the 2-2. Until defenders Justen Blok, Lars Balk and Jip Janssen, after a short deliberation, go to referee Goengten. They request the video referee. They have seen a high ball and therefore dangerous play from Will Calnan on Blok’s hip.
First, Goengten judges that the Netherlands is too late in applying for the VAR. ” You have to do it immediately ,” he says. But after the insistence of the three Dutch defenders, he decides on a compromise. He asks Video Referee Keogh to find out exactly how long their appeal took after his whistle.
Keogh studies the images carefully. She notes that it took thirteen seconds for the Orange to request the VAR and informs Goengten about this. ” That’s fine for me ,” he says. According to the rules, the maximum time span is twenty seconds. Goengten approves the video referee’s request.
Referee Goengten overrules video referee Keogh
Keogh then starts working on the request from the Dutch national team. She concludes, after viewing the footage from various angles, that Lars Balk made a stick tackle on Will Calnan and that Goengten rightly gave advantage. However, she forgets to look at why the Netherlands requested the VAR: Calnan’s possible dangerous play. Her advice to Goengten is that he should award England’s goal. ‘ There is no clear reason to change your decision. ‘
Goengten is amazed. He asks her if there was no dangerous play? ” Um …” she stammers. ‘ No… Well, let me go back. Let me go back.’ Keogh realizes she didn’t look at that at all and decides to study the footage again. ” I’m sorry ,” she apologizes. Now she concludes that Calnan’s ball on Blok’s hip was indeed dangerous play. This time her advice is to disallow the goal. You can give a free hit to the defence. ‘
Again, Goengten disagrees with that decision. ‘ But Ally, you said before there was a stick tackle ‘, he reacts in surprise. He confronts Keogh that Balk committed a stick tackle and England did not benefit from it when the goal was disallowed. Keogh acknowledges that. ” Well, okay ,” she says. Her advice is now to give a penalty corner. Goengten overrules her again. ‘ I would go for a penalty stroke. He awards a penalty shot.
A penalty saved by Maurits Visser. After noticing that he let his line too early we once again went to the VAR. A retake is ordered, and this time, staying on his line he makes another save to deny England the game-leveling goal.
In this way he will become the hero of Orange in this turbulent European Championship final .
by Hockey.nl
