It was a strange weekend for referee Darren England.
On Saturday, Farai Hallam, in charge of his first Premier League game, rejected England’s advice as the video assistant referee (VAR) and did not award a penalty to Manchester City for handball.
On Sunday, England’s role was reversed in Chelsea’s 3-1 win at Crystal Palace. This time he was the referee sent to the pitchside monitor to decide on a potential handball spot-kick.
Palace defender Jaydee Canvot had blocked Joao Pedro’s goal-bound shot with his arm, which was seemingly in a natural position down by his side.
England watched replays on the screen for almost two minutes, and BBC Sport understands he took a lot of persuading.
The VAR was Matt Donohue, who has refereed only four top-flight games but is on duty at Stockley Park most weekends.
Donohue insisted it should be a penalty because the arm had stopped a goal. Eventually, England concurred and awarded the spot-kick.
The International Football Association Board (Ifab) has previously clarified that, in this kind of scenario, it is not automatically a penalty.
On its Football Rules website, external, it asks the question: “A player prevents the ball from going into their own goal with their hand/arm but does not deliberately handle the ball and does not make their body unnaturally bigger?”
The answer is: “This is not a handball.”
Much of the confusion surrounds a law change in 2024. Ifab modified the wording on denying an obvious goalscoring opportunity (Dogso).
It now reads: “Where a player denies the opposing team a goal or an obvious goalscoring opportunity by committing a non-deliberate handball offence and the referee awards a penalty kick, the offender is cautioned.”
And here is the key point. It has to be an “offence” – in other words making the body unnaturally bigger.
It has incorrectly been interpreted that all handballs which stop a goal are a penalty and a yellow card. The change to the law was only from red card to yellow card.
First it has to be a handball offence, and then you consider the merits of Dogso.
The update was made to bring handball offences into line with foul challenges and double jeopardy.
So a genuine attempt to play the ball or non-deliberate handball where the body is made bigger are a caution.
