Video Assistant Referee (VAR) officials Darren England and Dan Cook have been replaced for two games this matchweek after Liverpool wrongly had a goal disallowed in their 2-1 Premier League defeat at Tottenham Hotspur on Saturday.

Liverpool went down to nine men as Curtis Jones and Diogo Jota were sent off in the feisty clash, before an own goal by Joel Matip sealed a stoppage-time win for Spurs.

The Merseyside club thought they had taken the lead in the first half through Luis Diaz who got behind the defence and fired into the bottom corner past goalkeeper Guglielmo Vicario. However, the goal was ruled out by the referee for offside.

The referees’ body, the Professional Game Match Officials Limited (PGMOL), later admitted it was the wrong decision to disallow Diaz’s effort, blaming human error, and “should have resulted in the goal being awarded through VAR intervention”.

In a statement on Sunday, the PGMOL said: “Darren England, VAR on the Tottenham Hotspur v Liverpool fixture, and Dan Cook, (assistant VAR) on the same game, have been replaced for the Nottingham Forest v Brentford and Fulham v Chelsea matches today and tomorrow night respectively.

“Craig Pawson will now assume England’s duties as fourth official at the City Ground while Eddie Smart will take over from Cook as assistant referee at Craven Cottage.”

Klopp upset

Liverpool manager Juergen Klopp was exasperated after the match.

“The (Diaz) offside goal. That’s not offside when you see it. They drew their lines wrong,” said Klopp. “The ball’s between Mo’s (Salah’s) legs. They ... didn’t judge the moment when Mo passed the ball right. It’s so tough to deal with it.

“We scored an own goal, that’s really tough to take... The first red card, Curtis steps on the ball and goes over. Not a bad tackle. It looks different in slow motion. He steps full throttle on the ball and goes over the ball. That’s unlucky.

“(Jota’s) first yellow was not a yellow. Then he gets a second and to defend with eight outfield players is tricky.”

Despite the nature of the defeat, Klopp said he was proud of his team’s backs-to-the-wall performance.

“You want to build something you need players with mentality and I saw them today (Saturday), they fought. Pretty special,” added Klopp, whose side last tasted defeat by Tottenham in 2017 and had lost once to them in their previous 21 league games.

Virgil van Dijk told BBC: “The VAR should be absolutely clear and obvious.”