LONDON: Former referee Mike Dean admitted Paul Tierney made a ‘big mistake’ before Liverpool scored a late victory over Nottingham Forest yesterday.
Darwin Nunez scored the only goal of the game in stoppage time as Liverpool won 1-0 to strengthen their challenge for the Premier League title.
However, much of the post-match analysis focused on Tierney following the incident involving Liverpool goalkeeper Caoimhin Kelleher.
Play was stopped after Liverpool defender Ibrahima Konate suffered a head injury when Callum Hudson-Odoi tried to cross for Forest.
After Konate recovered quickly, Kelleher resumed play but ended up passing the ball to his friend when he should have given the ball back to Forest.
Liverpool finally managed to find the net with substitute Nunez scoring the winning goal.
Although there was plenty of time between the incident and the goal, Dean felt Tierney should have stopped the game first.
Dean told Sky Sports : “Of course Nottingham Forest are angry, I would be angry too if I was involved with Nottingham Forest, but unfortunately the referee made a big mistake.
“I think he will know this morning that he made a mistake and hopefully he won’t repeat the same thing in the future.
“Unfortunately for Paul it was a mistake and it was a bad mistake, it led to the goal.
“The rules say whoever has the ball when play is stopped, the ball should be given back to them. Hudson-Odoi clearly had the ball and it should have been given to Nottingham Forest on the wing.”
Dean said that a statement should be issued after the match admitting that a mistake had been made.
However Dean said the incident which saw Forest owner Evangelos Marinakis clash with Tierney after the match should not have happened.