Tottenham manager Ange Postecoglou revealed that the club had contacted the PGMOL with evidence of Guglielmo Vicario’s obstruction on the pitch when taking corners and free-kicks. The Spurs goalkeeper has faced a number of interventions in recent games against Manchester City and Everton.
Postecoglou expressed his frustration over this issue. He said that they had sent evidence highlighting instances where Vicario had been obstructed by opponents to prevent him from effectively defending set-pieces. He stated that although he did not normally question referees, he felt that the rules on how a goalkeeper could be dispossessed of the ball in his own penalty area needed to be clarified.
“I haven’t [spoken to the referees]. I find it difficult to deal with these things. As I said before, I’ve kind of always been one who says you have to respect the decision of the referee or the umpire, but I think we’ve sent some things out to get some clarification,” the Australian boss said.
“I’ll be called for that, but it was a pretty obvious thing in the game that the goalkeeper was a protected type. I don’t think it was just me. People were saying that because if you really obstruct the goalkeeper in any way in a six-metre box, you’re going to get a foul. I knew that as a player, I knew that as a manager.
“There seems to be a shift. Someone will tell me that the rules haven’t changed, but I think there has been a shift because now … in my opinion it’s obstruction. If you stand in front of the goalkeeper and stop him before the ball has arrived, that is, in my words, obstruction. Now, somebody is going to tell me that this is not the law either, which would not surprise me.
“But it was something that I kind of thought was part of the game. I’ve seen it in the overall game, I’ve seen our guys get blocked when other guys have tried to shut them down, and it’s weird to me that it doesn’t drag on anymore. What is it going to do to the goalkeepers now? Well, it’s opened it up quite a lot to be able to go around the goalkeeper and squeeze him into a crowd, impose balls on him and just wait for the fight to be over and see what happens.
He added: “I was really proud of Vic the other day. I think they had nine corners after we scored and I think he dealt with every one of them by coming out and actually trying, rather than standing on his line and saying, ‘No, I don’t want to expose myself’.
“I can’t praise him enough for the way he’s dealt with it, and the whole thing about people saying you’ve got to be stronger, well, what does that mean? If he pushes or does anything to a player, you have no chance with VAR. There will be a penalty against you.
“Now we say to our players: ‘Be careful in the box, with VAR they are looking for everything, a little tug on the shirt or a little push will not get you out of a penalty’. So how can goalkeepers be stronger in that sense when there is someone standing next to you who is hindering you from doing your job? If there is contact before the ball comes, I thought that was obstruction.
“As I said before, I will be criticised because I am probably behind the clock and maybe there has been a change in the rules, but in my opinion there has definitely been a shift because we have definitely scored two goals, maybe three goals [against us], which in the past might have been a foul on the goalkeeper, and not only in our games, I have seen it in other games as well.”