Jürgen Klopp has alleged Liverpool’s FA Cup tie against West Bromwich Albion was cut short by six minutes on the orders of broadcasters.
Liverpool’s fourth-round defeat on Saturday was frequently interrupted by the referee Craig Pawson’s use of VAR. The match official used the review system on eight separate occasions and, in the first half alone, employed VAR to disallow an Albion goal, award a penalty to Liverpool and allow the visitors’ third goal.
Play was halted for three minutes and 53 seconds for the review of Liverpool's penalty and Albion were forced to substitute two players because of injury before half-time, yet the fourth official, Jon Moss, added only four minutes stoppage time at the end of the first half. Klopp has claimed that decision was taken for television reasons, with the tie broadcast live on BT Sport.
The Liverpool manager said: “What I heard was that the actual extra time in the first half should have been 10 minutes. It was only four minutes. I heard that television said it’s not longer than four minutes.
“Of course that’s not possible, you can’t cut match time because there is something else to broadcast. I don’t know what was on afterwards, maybe the news or something. It was 10 minutes and so you need to play 10 minutes longer. You cannot say it’s now a little bit too long.”
A spokesperson for BT Sport said it had no influence on the amount of time added to a game. - Guardian service
