Premier League referees to continue working abroad despite huge Darren England blunder over Luis Diaz goal in Tottenham-Liverpool clash

According to The Telegraph, match officials have been given approval to continue freelancing in foreign countries, as an investigation revealed that such activities did not contribute to the controversial Liverpool offside goal incident. The incident occurred during Liverpool's 2-1 defeat to Tottenham in September, where Luis Diaz's goal was incorrectly ruled out. It was later disclosed that the video assistant referees involved had officiated a match in the United Arab Emirates just two days prior. In response to the Var crisis, the Professional Game Match Officials Ltd (PGMOL), along with the Football Association, decided to reassess the policy allowing referees to oversee games outside of FIFA and UEFA appointments.

Howard Webb, the head of PGMOL, said: "In terms of that specific trip out to the Middle East, there was no link found from that to the error. Of course, we know it created noise.”

Webb further revealed that there will be no blanket ban on the freelancing of referees but each request will be taken up by the PGMOL board and judge on its merits.
The former referee added: "Each request will be evaluated on its own merits. But we’ll only consider an approach from an overseas national federation on the condition it provides a development opportunity for the officials and that it has no impact at all on their availability to serve the leagues we exist to serve. Any such request would need to be approved by the PGMOL board. That’s our position. We’ve had no more requests since that one. Nobody’s been out to do that.”

However, there have been concerns about potential conflicts of interest. Notably, England and Cook worked in the UAE, which has strong connections with Premier League champions Manchester City. Whereas, Michael Oliver, despite Newcastle United's ownership links to Saudi Arabia, was allowed to officiate in the Saudi Pro League. This situation gave rise to discussions about the balance between referee assignments and ownership affiliations.

Despite having concerns, there is no suggestion of a conflict of interest arising in the specific case of the Spurs-Liverpool match. It is a common practice for officials to work on foreign matches, often on Thursday nights in competitions like the UEFA Europa League, before returning to domestic action on Saturdays. In such instances, referees who have travelled are typically assigned off-field roles, such as the Video Assistant Referee (VAR).