OPINION: Is it time the Premier League turned to referees from abroad?

The refereeing body admitted "a significant human error" in VAR's decision not to allow Luis Diaz's goal which would have given Liverpool the lead against Tottenham.

Moments prior, VAR had also contentiously upgraded Curtis Jones' yellow card to a red after a studs-up challenge on Yves Bissouma was framed particularly heavily against the Liverpool player - although whether a red was warranted is debatable.

Then there was the red card for Jota - while silly for him to make that second challenge knowing he was already on a booking, his first "bookable offence" should never have been given (why can't VAR look at that as "clear and obvious error", by the way?).

But the colossal mistake in not allowing Diaz's goal - which could clearly be seen to be onside at the time and during replays with the naked eye and without any lines being drawn - has added immense fuel to a fire that the refereeing standard in supposedly the best league in the world simply isn't up to par.

In a statement on Sunday, refereeing body PGMOL apologised while Liverpool released a scathing statement of their own, suggesting "sporting integrity was being undermined" and threatening some sort of further action by "exploring their options".

Sorry not enough

What would that entail, though? What would Liverpool expect to get out of this situation more than the apology they've already received?

A replay simply won't happen - to punish or in any way criminalise Tottenham for the referees' poor performance would be ludicrous.

Suing the Premier League for some sort of compensation would also be farcical - it's highly unlikely to hold up. Although, if in the slim chance, Liverpool now miss out on a Premier League title or Champions League place as a result, perhaps they'd have more of a case in future based on mega financial losses.

But that would begin to set an unsustainable precedent similar to what we've seen before with Sheffield United suing over Carlos Tevez's time at West Ham, or even what we're seeing with Felipe Massa in Formula 1 currently.

The officials were stood down for the rest of the weekend's fixtures and should really be permanently removed from Premier League games for the remainder of the season, for their own personal safety and benefit as much as everyone else's.

They were also reportedly allowed to work a match in the UAE days prior to Saturday's game at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, with many claiming fatigue could have been a factor in their decision-making.

They were even green-lit by PGMOL boss Howard Webb to make the trip, so this is something that needs to be brought to a halt immediately - it's not a good look at all.

But is it time we went further and looked further afield - quite literally?

Foreign imports

The Premier League has long styled itself as the best, most entertaining, most lucrative and most competitive league in domestic professional football - due in no small part to its ability to attract the world's best footballers, managers and coaches from across the world.

Perhaps it's time to accept that refereeing in England needs a drastic and radical overhaul - much like the grassroots programme put in place to improve the competitiveness of the national team introduced in 2014 by the FA - and while that tall task is undertaken, maybe the Premier League should begin hiring top referees from abroad?

The Middle East has made a regular habit of importing match officials from Europe's top leagues for its own domestic fixtures.

And even the most casual of English football fans watching matches in the Champions League, Europa League or World Cup will have noticed the difference in standards not only with the match officials on the field but also the effectiveness of VAR in action.

Is it high time we begin to explore some sort of model to import referees and VAR assistants who are actually more fit for purpose with the high stakes and high-pressure decisions at play in the Premier League?

Even if just a temporary measure to allow for a decade of the FA, Premier League and PGMOL getting their house in order.

Invest in AI ASAP

More also needs to be done to accelerate the development and automated nature of the tools currently being used to make decisions.

It's ridiculous that in 2023, at the height of technology and with artificial intelligence becoming increasingly affordable, valuable and inevitable in the world, we're still relying on a group of humans sitting in a room in the middle of nowhere subjectively drawing lines manually on a screen.

The whole clamour for VAR was originally to introduce a machine-like, indisputable, 100 per cent factually correct decision quickly, clearly and effectively.

What we have right now is simply more cooks in the kitchen, talking over each other and creating more havoc than we had before.

Prior to VAR's introduction, Luis Diaz's goal would've been given offside, pundits, managers and fans would have all grumbled for the next few days and we would have all moved on and chalked it up to "one of those things".

Now though, we're supposed to have an expensive system that works, and yet somehow it feels more broken than ever before - probably because we have more inept referees than ever before making more poor decisions than ever before when they actually have more helpful tools to get it right than ever before.

It has become of the utmost importance now that this is an issue that drastically needs fixing.

This is the 13th apology from the PGMOL regarding an incorrect VAR decision since the 2021/22 season began - no other major league has made anywhere near that many drastic errors.

The PGMOL needs to accept it is currently unfit for purpose and the Premier League and FA both must take a hard stance to help them rectify issues that are now purely of the refereeing body's own making.