There was a sense of injustice inside St James’ Park as Andy Madley called time on Newcastle United vs Liverpool.
It was a breathless 90 minutes, as Newcastle United and Liverpool played out a modern Premier League classic. It truly was thrilling if you were a neutral, but the end of the game provoked outrage from Toon fans.
It ended Newcastle 3 Liverpool 3, but Eddie Howe’s side were denied to chance to grab a fourth.
With the five minutes of stoppage up, Nick Pope attempted to launch one more counterattack. He bowled the ball forwards to Alexander Isak, who had Joe Willock and Callum Wilson to his right.
The break was on, only for referee Andy Madley to blow the final whistle. Martin Keown has suggested that Newcastle should have been allowed to play on, while Pope was booked for his reaction to the referee’s decision. Meanwhile, Toon fans chanted ‘who’s the scouser in the blue’.
Newcastle should have been allowed to play on vs Liverpool
The referee and Liverpool fans will argue that the five minutes of stoppage time had been played.
However, the ball was barely in play for a large portion of the allocated time. There were delays for two Liverpool penalty appeals, including a comical one for a Dan Burn handball. That resulted in a plethora of Liverpool players surrounding the referee, which I am sure you are not actually allowed to do…
There was also a delay for a Newcastle free-kick, which Alexander Isak put over the bar.
Out of the five minutes allocated, the ball was actually dead for two of those minutes. Admittedly, some of that time is the natural stoppage of play, including when Liverpool prepared their wall for the Isak free-kick.
But to not add any additional time on for the time spent on the penalty appeals is disgraceful, as Andy Madley ended the game on 95 minutes and 10 seconds. Maybe he had somewhere else to be and needed to rush off! Otherwise, what is his excuse for blowing the final whistle so soon?!
What happened at Anfield in 2022 sums up Newcastle injustice
This is where the hypocrisy starts, as there was a similar situation when Newcastle and Liverpool met at Anfield in August 2022.
The score was level at 1-1, with five minutes of stoppage time to be played. In the 98th minute, Fabio Carvalho netted a winner for Jurgen Klopp’s side, while Liverpool fans pointed towards Newcastle’s alleged time-wasting as vindication for the added time in added time.
Mehrdad Ghodoussi said it was an ‘absolute joke’, as the game appeared to carry on until Liverpool snatched a winner.
It rightly infuriated Newcastle United, and it makes what happened on Wednesday night even more ridiculous. An embarrassing bit of officiating cost Newcastle the chance to grab a deserved winner, and it will be a bitter pill to swallow for those players who remember what happened at Anfield two years ago.
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