Refereeing and VAR errors increase in Premier League

Newcastle should have been awarded a penalty at Chelsea on 14 March Refereeing mistakes on the field and through the video assistant referee have risen across most categories in this season's Premier League. The Premier League's Key Match Incidents (KMI) panel declared another four errors by referees in its latest report, taking the total to 54. At the same stage last season there had been 44 wrong or missed VAR interventions, or on-field mistakes which did not reach the threshold for a video review. Professional Game Match Officials (PGMO) says the general trend is positive, with 70 mistakes after 30 games of the 2023-24 campaign. But there have already been as many VAR errors this season (18) as in the whole of the last campaign - although with a quarter of the season left, that figure is much lower than the overall total for 2022-23 (38) and 2023-34 (31). One area of improvement has been incorrect VAR reviews, which have fallen from four to three. However, season-on-season there have been more missed VAR interventions (15), on-field errors (25) and incorrect second yellow card decisions (11). In the round of matches between 14 and 16 March, the KMI Panel determined that three pe