In the late Chelsea referee drama, the Premier League had to make two Man United VAR statements.

While Manchester United and Chelsea played to a dull 1-1 draw, referee Rob Jones didn’t get too much attention until the last 20 minutes. Not much had happened before Rob Sanchez started to claw at Rasmus Hojlund’s feet.

Chelsea was a little mad that Wesley Fofana and Levi Colwill weren’t given penalties for their actions with Manuel Ugarte and Lisandro Martinez in the first half, but the protests didn’t go much further than shouts at first. United thought Fofana might have tripped Alejandro Garnacho as he tried to cross the ball.

But nothing was sent to a big VAR review, and not much took a lot of time to play. It was a mirror of the first 45 minutes, which showed where both teams were weak.

There wasn’t long left, and Hojlund took down a long ball and tried to go around Sanchez. Jones had no choice but to point to the spot. Even though he was facing away from the goal, the Chelsea custodian still tried to grab the ball. He missed, Hojlund went down, and there was a penalty.

Sanchez was furious, but VAR (Michael Salisbury and Nick Hopton at Stockley Park) agreed with Jones and gave Ruud van Nistelrooy’s team a great chance to take the lead. The Premier League made the reason for the call public on the official Match Centre X (formerly Twitter) feed.

“The referee awarded a penalty for a foul by Sanchez on Hojlund,” it says. “The VAR checked and confirmed the referee’s call.” Simple and nice. He scored, Bruno Fernandes.

Soon after, Chelsea answered, and the game looked like it might turn into even more of the crazy event that everyone had been expecting. However, most of the players weren’t up to that level of play, and it wasn’t until Martinez’s late, angry tackle on Cole Palmer did things really get heated, the way United vs. Chelsea games have in the past.

Palmer chipped the United defender in the middle of the pitch as he tried to start a counterattack. The defender spun around and kicked the ball out. Martinez hit Palmer high on the leg of the Chelsea star.

As a professional, Gary Neville said, “That one where you leave your studs, you know you’re not getting the ball, and you go in knee-high.” “To be fair you’re asking for a red card.”

Even though VAR checked, nothing else was done because Salisbury didn’t agree. Neville went on, “I think he’s lucky.” “I think when you go knee-high and the ball’s gone, with studs, I’m not quite sure what sort of interpretation it is but I think that is a red.”

“The referee gave Martinez a yellow card for a challenge on Palmer,” Match Centre said to make the situation clearer. VAR looked for a possible red card and agreed with the referee that there wasn’t one because it was a reckless tackle.

Mike Dean, a former judge, agreed. The former official said, “He’s come down and just caught the end of his knee with his studs.” “There’s not a lot of force in it, it’s more of a glancing blow down across his knee rather than endangering the safety of an opponent.”

Players for Chelsea reacted angrily to the challenge and went up to Martinez and Jones to talk to them. In the end, it was a rare flashpoint in a game that didn’t go very well; not even VAR caused too much debate. If the game hadn’t been in extra time, the call to let Martinez stay on the pitch might have caused more trouble.