Legendary former referee Pierluigi Collina, now Chief Refereeing Officer at FIFA, has defended the refereeing decisions taken during the Argentina vs. Egypt match at the World Cup on Tuesday, and stated that "nobody can claim that FIFA Refereeing can be influenced by anyone, not even by the FIFA President".
The now famous match ended 3-2 for Argentina, and had two very controversial moments: when VAR had the referee François Letexier disallowed Egypt's goal because of a foul by an Egyptian player previously in the play, and when VAR did not intervene in a similar situation, a potential foul made by an Argentinian player seconds before they scored the third goal.
With Egypt coach saying they had been cheated and suggesting that the tournament is rigged so that Leo Messi can last longer, and the Egyptian Football Federation lodging a complaint to FIFA and asking the referees and VAR officials of the match to be expelled from the competition, Collina has reaffirmed that the referee made the right decisions.
"After every goal is scored, the VAR checks the attacking possession phase (APP). If a foul is identified in the build-up and is deemed to have had an impact on the goal, the VAR will recommend an on-field review. There is no defined limit regarding either the distance from goal or the amount of time between the incident and the goal", Collina explained, referring specifically to the Egypt Argentina match as an example, saying that "Marwan Attia clearly treaded on the foot of Lisandro Martínez", even if the foul happened in the other side of the pitch.
"We believe that a foul is a foul. Regardless of whether the foul appears 'obvious', if the referee did not see it on the field of play, the VAR can intervene", Collina said.
He added that they found no foul in the build up for Argentina's third goal, when Julián Álvarez made contact with Mohamed Salah after touching the ball. "Stepping on an opponent's foot is a foul, whereas a defender who touches the ball first and then makes normal football contact has not committed a foul. The referee and the VAR deemed it normal football contact between Mohamed Salah and Julián Alvarez.."
Collina, as head of the referees at FIFA, has also explained other controversial decisions at the World Cup, including a goal disallowed to Germany because of an attacking players preventing the goalkeeper to move.