Referee admitted Liverpool shouldn't have been awarded a penalty against Fulham, claims midfielder Tom Cairney

• Cottagers held their own at Anfield
• Spot-kick proved to be decisive
• Salah made no mistake from 12 yards

WHAT HAPPENED? The Cottagers held their own for long periods against the top four-chasing Reds at Anfield, but were ultimately undone by a 39th-minute spot-kick from Mohamed Salah. That decision was made when Darwin Nunez went down in the box under pressure from Issa Diop, but replays suggest that the Fulham defender managed to avoid contact with the Uruguayan forward and that VAR intervention should have reversed a big call. Cairney claims that Attwell conceded as much during the second half on Merseyside.

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WHAT THEY SAID: The Cottagers midfielder has told his club’s official website of a surprising admission from the match officials during a frustrating evening out on the road: “I thought we played very well at times, but to lose to a penalty that wasn’t a penalty is always a kick in the you-know-whats. At the time, I wasn’t sure [if it was a penalty]. The ref made a decision, I thought he’d seen contact. I asked him on the pitch, ‘please just make sure they check it.’ He said they checked it, but he said second half to one of our players that it wasn’t a penalty, so it’s frustrating because it goes to other people to make the correct decision. Issa Diop hasn’t touched him, Nunez has taken another step and then gone over, and then you lose to something like that at Anfield which is frustrating when we’re trying to climb as high as we can.”

THE BIGGER PICTURE: The 2022-23 Premier League season has been littered with instances of match official and VAR teams getting big decisions wrong, with PGMOL having to offer apologies to those that have been impacted by some questionable decision making.

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WHAT NEXT? Liverpool’s win in midweek has kept them in the hunt for a top-four finish, as they sit four points adrift of Manchester United in the last Champions League qualification spot, while Fulham remain in 10th place after enjoying a productive run on the back of promotion in 2021-22.