Howard Webb explains why Arsenal's Myles Lewis-Skelly should not have been sent off vs Wolves
English football's refereeing chief Howard Webb has said Arsenal's Myles Lewis-Skelly should not have been sent off in last month's Premier League match at Wolverhampton Wanderers because his challenge had no 'excessive force or brutality'.
The full-back, 18, was shown a straight red card for 'serious foul play' by referee Michael Oliver in the 43rd minute of the game on January 25 after a challenge on Wolves defender Matt Doherty.
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The club later appealed against what would have been a three-match ban for Lewis-Skelly and were successful in overturning the sanction.
Webb said that on-field referee Michael Oliver saw the situation as 'serious foul play' which would merit a red, but the former referee insisted he would 'prefer a yellow card in this situation'.
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Speaking on the incident on the Match Officials Mic'd Up programme, released on Tuesday, February 18, Webb said: 'He (Oliver) saw a player moving in towards an opponent without any ability to play the ball, without any intention of playing the ball and with the intention of stopping the opponent. And the referee sees a raised foot make high contact and then the opponent go down.
'So in his opinion, it was serious foul play. The VAR checked the footage to see whether that decision was clearly and obviously wrong and determined that it wasn't, seeing that contact that was quite high on the leg.'
However, Webb then caveated the decision by outlining how the foul itself did not merit a red card.
'We know that for serious foul play we need excessive force or brutality,' Webb continued. 'And what we see here is that high contact glancing and coming off the leg quite quickly.
'So for that reason, everybody pretty much in the game has formed the same conclusion that we now form, that this is falling short of serious foul play because of that glancing contact, because the studs don't really go right into the leg and they glance it before coming down onto the foot.'
Arsenal went on to win the game 1-0 through a late Riccardo Calafiori goal, with Joao Gomes shown a red card for Wolves in the 70th minute.
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(James Gill – Danehouse/Getty Images)
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