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Paramedic with Newman 35 seconds after crash

Published in Breaking News
Saturday, 22 February 2020 11:05

LAS VEGAS -- A paramedic was treating Ryan Newman inside his car 35 seconds after the ruined and flaming vehicle came to rest after a crash on the last lap of the Daytona 500.

NASCAR gave a brief timeline Saturday of the response to Monday night's airborne accident that was so startling many drivers feared him dead. Newman hit the wall and his car went airborne, was hit by another car to send it airborne a second time, rolled upside down and landed on its roof in flames.

"You've heard us say this many times, that safety is our primary responsibility," said Steve O'Donnell, NASCAR's executive vice president and chief racing development officer.

"Everything that goes on at the R&D Center on a daily basis is put in place for a reason. This is our job. This is what we do, and you've got the 40 drivers in the garage area who expect us to do this every day."

NASCAR said the first fire responder arrived 19 seconds after Newman's car stopped. A trauma doctor was at the car 33 seconds later and a paramedic entered 2 seconds after that.

Newman was then treated for more than three minutes, NASCAR said. It took roughly two minutes to overturn the car, during which time Newman was still being assisted and the treatment continued as the roof was cut away. The 42-year-old driver was removed from the car 15 minutes, 40 seconds after it halted.

NASCAR revealed its findings from a review that began Tuesday when the cars of Newman and Corey LaJoie, the driver who hit Newman's car on the driver's side, arrived at the North Carolina Research and Development Center.

NASCAR said it could not discuss Newman's health, citing federal privacy laws.

Despite the violence of the crash, the Indiana native nicknamed "Rocketman" walked out of a Florida hospital holding the hands of his two young daughters some 42 hours later.

"During this entire time, doctors and paramedics were attending to Ryan, except for during the car rollover," O'Donnell said. "The first responders performed their jobs as they were trained. The training systems all worked as were designed.

"We are never satisfied with what took place and we will learn as much as possible and implement those changes, if there are any, as soon as possible."

Ross Chastain is scheduled to drive Newman's No. 6 Ford on Sunday at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, where Newman's 649-consecutive races streak dating to the 2002 Daytona 500 will end.

Newman has yet to speak publicly and his team has said nothing about his injuries or his status. Roush said he was in serious condition with non-life threatening injuries late Monday night, but Newman progressed so quickly he left the hospital faster than the team could post updates.

NASCAR said the sanctioning body and Newman's medical team will have to clear him before he can return to race, but good friend Martin Truex Jr. said Saturday to expect Newman back in his race car soon.

"I feel like he'll be back before anyone thinks he could. He's a tough son of a gun," Truex said. "It was good to see how good a shape he was in, and it was a little surprising as well. He's got no neck and a big hard head, so that helped for sure."

Several competitors have talked or texted with Newman and said his wit remained intact, with many making lighthearted jokes at his expense. Many marveled how one of the toughest guys in the garage seemingly walked away unscathed, needing nothing more than his daily fix of Krispy Kreme doughnuts to get out of the hospital.

NASCAR also wants to speak to Newman. Its crash report was limited because it wants feedback from the driver, an engineering graduate from Purdue University.

Newman, the 2008 Daytona 500 winner, has has been involved in several rolls at superspeedways. He has been outspoken about safety and has been fined by NASCAR for criticism it deemed excessive.

Newman also advocated for more support in the cockpit for protection during rollovers. A device now referred to as the "Newman bar" is standard.

"Ryan's feedback in this will be key," O'Donnell said. "I think that'll be a key component as it's always been throughout the process when he's been racing."

O'Donnell also said changes won't be made to overtime rules as a result of the accident, but work continues dissecting Newman's crash and ongoing safety efforts.

"Our job now is to have continued dialogue with the drivers, see what happens in terms of this race package," O'Donnell said. "Were there any changes from Talladega to Daytona in terms of how they raced? How that may have contributed or not to this incident and if we can make some changes we will."

NASCAR also must balance the fan appreciation of the dangers of Daytona and Talladega with the safety of the show.

"Our job is to get the races in, make them exciting for the fans and not have those kinds of incidents," O'Donnell said. "So, if we can improve on that, we'll do that."

Caps' Ovechkin collects goal No. 700 against Devils

Published in Breaking News
Saturday, 22 February 2020 12:14

Washington Capitals forward Alex Ovechkin became the eighth player in NHL history to reach 700 goals, scoring a third-period goal on Saturday vs. the New Jersey Devils.

The Russian winger now takes up residence in one of the most exclusive clubs in NHL history, joining Wayne Gretzky, Gordie Howe, Jaromir Jagr, Brett Hull, Marcel Dionne, Phil Esposito and Mike Gartner.

On his way to 700, Ovechkin, 34, orchestrated a run that is lofty even for his standards, scoring 16 goals in a 10-game run, stretching from Jan. 7-Feb. 4, that landed him on 698. Included in that stretch was three hat tricks.

It took six more games to get to 699, which came Thursday against the Montreal Canadiens. No. 700 was only one game and two days after that.

As buzz began to build for the milestone since the turn of the calendar year, Ovechkin was asked time and again about what it means to him. Typically mild-mannered in front of the microphone, Ovechkin often responded generically. Though he's clearly honored to be with that group, he didn't want to spend too much time reveling in it. Not with Washington trying to secure the No. 1 overall seed in the postseason, and its second Stanley Cup championship in three years.

"I'm still playing," Ovechkin said earlier this month. "But after the year, yeah, I'm pretty sure me and my family and my friends are going to talk about it."

Even beyond 700, Ovechkin's numbers continue to be headline-grabbing. Due in part to that 10-game stretch, he now has 27 career hat tricks and 11 40-goal seasons.

"If you're going to think about it too much, you're never going to get it," Ovechkin said earlier this month. "So I have to go out there and play."

Ovechkin remains No. 8 on the all-time goals list, but is closing in on Gartner (708), the former Capitals forward, at No. 7. Ovechkin passed Hall of Fame center Mark Messier for eighth place earlier this season.

Ovechkin is the first Russian player to reach 700, and the third Capital to make the list, joining Gartner and Jagr, though neither recorded that milestone tally in a Washington uniform.

The last player to reach that mark overall, in fact, was Jagr, who scored for the Devils on March 1, 2014 against the Islanders.

White Sox agree to deals with Bummer, Garcia

Published in Baseball
Saturday, 22 February 2020 10:54

GLENDALE, Ariz. -- The Chicago White Sox agreed Saturday to a $16 million, five-year contract with reliever Aaron Bummer that includes two club options, and a $3.5 million, one-year deal with infielder Leury Garcia.

Bummer is due $1 million in 2020, $2 million in 2021, $2.5 million in 2022, $3.75 million in 2023 and $5.5 million in 2024. The White Sox hold options for $7.25 million in 2025 and $7.5 million in 2026, with $1.25 million buyouts for either season.

Garcia gets $3.25 million in 2020, with the White Sox holding a $3.5 million option for 2021 with a $250,000 buyout. He avoided arbitration by agreeing to a one-year, $3.25-million contract in January.

The 26-year-old Bummer had a 2.13 ERA and 27 holds in 58 appearances with the White Sox last season.

Garcia, 29, hit .279 with eight home runs, 40 RBIs and a team-leading 93 runs for Chicago last year.

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. -- The 2017 Houston Astros were cheaters. They were selfish, unfair, wrong. Their actions influenced opponents' careers. Their championship is tarnished.

And with all that being true, they do not deserve this.

Perhaps this was inevitable -- that the fallout of the Astros' sign-stealing scandal would include cowards protected by the anonymity of social media allegedly issuing death threats to players and wishing cancer upon their children -- and here we are.

As much consternation and pearl-clutching as there has been about what the Astros' cheating means, how it's a reflection of modern society, let's be honest: The response to the Astros, and to Mike Fiers, the whistleblower who unveiled the team's misdeeds, is far more representative of life in 2020.

Certainly this runs the risk of sounding obvious, and those with consciences already are nodding their heads, but the Astros so deeply inflame emotions that this warrants not just attention but empathy. Don't mistake that for lessening the egregiousness of what they did either. It's simply another truth here, one worth remembering as the scandal's tentacles reach into the principals' personal lives: The Astros did something bad; they didn't do something so bad that they should ever be in a position to say the following.

"I put a post on my kid rolling over for the first time and I gotta look down there and see: 'I hope your kid gets cancer,'" Astros outfielder Josh Reddick said.

"They start talking about raping, talking about killing and all this stuff," shortstop Carlos Correa said.

"I think ultimately the family safety is a big issue right now," Reddick said.

"They are the ones that [are] exposed the most," Correa said.

Cancer. Raping. Killing. Family.

It's easy to hide underneath the cloak of invincibility offered by social media, which is high on impulsivity and low on accountability -- easy to tap away at a phone or clack at a keyboard, reach down to the deepest, darkest place and emit a stream of pure, unmitigated hatred. And it's not just the cheating scandal that propagated this. Correa said he received menacing messages after his costly error in the 2015 division series and following his game-winning home run in the 2019 American League Championship Series, too.

Reddick and Correa went public Friday following a three-hour meeting with the Major League Baseball Players Association, during which the players, Correa said, spent a significant amount of time discussing security efforts for the upcoming season. The Astros, sources said, will receive increased security, particularly when on the road. The details are of particular import to the team, which has weathered a volcano-force eruption of anger inside and outside the sport over the lack of suspensions players received for the scheme of their own doing.

The notion that Astros players haven't been punished simply isn't true. It manifests itself in ways relatable to all, even those most aggrieved. There are the deserved costs: the loss of respect from their peers, the permanent brand of "cheater," the question of whether to strip their 2017 championship altogether. There are the ones that are fair but still warrant sympathy, even for those whose actions were patently unsympathetic. One Astros player this week admitted he sought therapy for depression over the winter. He didn't want his name used because he feared the blowback would leave him a target for scrutiny by those who would accuse him of playing the world's smallest violin. At the same time, he admitted, this is something of his own doing and he expects nobody to feel sorry for him.

Still, to deny that the human cost of this scandal reaches the Astros too is to lack the very same empathy the Astros did when they chose themselves and their goals over what was right. It's hypocrisy personified.

And when the punishment extends so far beyond the pale, it's worth stepping back and recalibrating. Yes, the vast, vast majority of those on social media stay within the bounds of decency, and it tends to be a small handful of trolls who breach decorum, vomit awfulness and hit send. Just as the Astros should be held accountable, so should they. The fecklessness of social-media platforms to police their darkest corners allowed this to happen, not just in sports but everywhere. That is a far truer shame than anything the Astros did or can do.

Everyone on social media has seen it. Someone once told me that he hopes I die in front of my kids on Christmas ... because I wrote a column saying Kansas City fans should not have booed Robinson Cano at the Home Run Derby in 2012. Maybe it's just a fact of life today. That's a hard thing to accept, to believe the world is so black-and-white that whether it's a difference of opinion or an error of great consequence or, in Fiers' case, a service to the game he loves, someone -- anyone -- believes that it warrants the invocation of cancer or rape or death, of the truest horrors we know.

Selfish, unfair, wrong. Yeah. That sounds about right.

Hassell-Collins scores four as Exiles hold off Gloucester

Published in Rugby
Saturday, 22 February 2020 08:51

Ollie Hassell-Collins scored four tries as London Irish leapfrogged Gloucester to move into the Premiership top five.

The England Under-20s winger scored a quick-fire double in the first half to help the Exiles into a 10-3 lead.

The 21-year-old then intercepted and raced 60m for his hat-trick score before Gloucester hit back with tries from Charlie Chapman and Ollie Thorley.

Hassell-Collins' fourth made it 24-15 but a late try for Louis Rees-Zammit gave Gloucester a losing bonus point.

It was a third league defeat in a row for the visitors though, who drop to seventh, while the Exiles surged to a third straight win.

The Exiles dominated the early exchanges but Billy Twelvetrees opened the scoring with a penalty on Gloucester's first foray into the hosts' territory after Thorley's counter-attack.

But Irish responded swiftly, a flicked pass from Nick Phipps to Stephen Myler after a 5m scrum seeing the fly-half put Hassell-Collins over in the left corner.

It was far too easy from a Gloucester perspective, with their blind-side defence exposed, and the Exiles punished further lapses with their second try five minutes later.

Hassell-Collins brushed off a weak tackle from scrum-half Charlie Chapman, making his first Premiership start for Gloucester, and stretched over for his second score.

Twelvetrees missed a further penalty attempt before the interval as the visitors came back into it and they started the second period on the attack.

But Hassell-Collins picked off a pass on his own 22 to race away for his hat-trick try, Myler - who had missed his first two conversion attempts - this time adding the extras for a 17-3 lead.

Gloucester, to their credit, responded well and scrum-half Chapman danced his way over from a 5m scrum, Twelvetrees adding the extras to bring the visitors within range.

Thorley's superb finish in the corner made it a two-point game, with Twelvetrees unable to convert.

But a clever offload from Motu Matu'u - who started at hooker after the late withdrawal of Dave Porecki - saw Terrence Hepetema put Hassell-Collins for his fourth try, taking his league tally to the season for seven as the Exiles earned a bonus point.

Gloucester replaced fly-half Danny Cipriani, playing the day after releasing an emotional video tribute to ex-girlfriend Caroline Flack, who took her own life last week, with youngster Lloyd Evans.

Matt Rogerson had a further try for the hosts disallowed by the TMO, and a smart finish from Rees-Zammit - the teenager scoring his seventh league try of the campaign, ensured a tense finish.

London Irish: Loader; Williams, Rona, Hepetema, Hassell-Collins; Myler, Phipps; Hobbs-Awoyemi, Matu'u, Hoskins, Coleman, Van der Merwe (capt), Rogerson, Cowan, Tuisue.

Replacements: Fainga'a, Elrington, Kepu, Mafi, Donnell, Meehan, Campbell, Stokes.

Gloucester: Banahan; Rees-Zammit, Twelvetrees, Atkinson, Thorley; Cipriani, Chapman; Hohneck, Gleave, Balmain, Slater, Mostert (capt), Clarke, Ludlow, Ackermann.

Replacements: Walker, Rapava-Ruskin, Knight, Morgan, Hinkley, Varney, Evans, Seabrook.

Referee: Luke Pearce.

The effects of inductive charging on lithium-ion batteries.

When Abby Dow is not scoring eye-catching tries for England, that is what is on her mind.

Apparently it is something to do with wireless chargers and, as the final-year project in her mechanical engineering degree, it is what occupies Dow's time when she is not in England camp.

The 22-year-old wing impressed with two tries at a snowy Murrayfield in the second round of the Women's Six Nations, but the match's postponement from Sunday to Monday meant there was no time to celebrate.

With the lithium-ion batteries calling, Dow was straight back to university in London to continue her experiments on the Tuesday after bad weather meant an overnight coach journey back from Scotland.

"It was the worst-case scenario," she says. "We had an issue with trying to get home because we couldn't fit all of us on the flight so we had to drive home.

"I got home early Tuesday morning for me to go in for a 9am tutorial. I got home at about 6pm and went straight to bed."

'Real focus' on World Cup

Dow is preparing to make her third successive Six Nations start against Ireland on Sunday and is the tournament's top try-scorer this season after playing just once in the competition last year.

The Wasps player secured her starting place in a competitive England back three after impressing in the autumn and her run of form is no accident 19 months out from the World Cup.

Dow is not currently a contracted player and so must keep her options open in case she needs to pursue an engineering rather than rugby career after she graduates in June.

But given her academic pursuits, it is no surprise that Dow has done the appropriate calculations and is ready to fully focus on sport with the World Cup in mind.

"[Last Six Nations] I was coming back from injury and I had university work on," she explains.

"I'm quite comfortable now in the sense that I don't need to get the grades I was getting over the last few years. I know the percentages I need to get the grades I want.

"It's a real focus this year I've taken in training prepping up to the World Cup. Hopefully that's shown on the pitch so I've been able to get selection."

'Both rugby and engineering need more women'

According to World Rugby statistics from 2016, women accounted for 2.2 million of the 8.5 million rugby players worldwide, while an Engineering UK report in 2018 found 12.37% of all engineers in the UK were women.

Dow says "there was no thought of gender" when she embarked on her careers in both areas. She played rugby because her brother and sister did - Ruth Dow also played for England - and followed in both her parents' footsteps academically.

But the Red Rose admits she would like to see more women taking the paths she has chosen.

"It's a hot topic, women in engineering and women in rugby," she adds.

"Both of them are desperately trying to get more women involved. It's something that should definitely be looked into because there's so much potential for both of them to get more people involved."

Chapple To Chase BOSS Sprint Car Championship

Published in Racing
Saturday, 22 February 2020 07:00

FORTVILLE, Ind. – Isaac Chapple will compete full time with the MPD Racing Buckeye Outlaw Sprint Series this season, driving his familiar No. 52 non-winged sprint car.

The 20-race BOSS schedule will feature stops at 13 different racetracks in four different states. Of the 13 tracks on the schedule, Isaac has previously competed at four of them.

This year brings a new challenge to Chapple’s family-owned race team, but one that he is eager for. He looks forward to not only change, but a fun and successful season as well.

“I’m super excited about our plans for the 2020 season. I have high expectations for us this year, but I’m also looking forward to a change of pace and having some fun,” Chapple said. “I really enjoy traveling and racing sprint cars and I’m just blessed and thankful that I can continue to do that year after year. I have some great supporters behind me and we’re all really like family. The relationships that I have with every sponsor and crew member are special and we have fun doing this deal together.

“I really like what Aaron (Fry) has going on right now with the BOSS series and I’m looking forward to following his tour this year,” Chapple added. “With the schedule being just 20 races, I’ll be able to go hit other shows as well. I just love racing sprint cars and we’re really excited to go have some fun this year.

“I know we can be successful if we keep it fun.”

Chapple will also contest other selected shows throughout the year in the Midwest as well.

The BOSS Sprint Car Series season begins March 28 at Waynesfield (Ohio) Raceway Park and wraps up Oct. 9 at Moler Raceway Park in Williamsburg, Ohio.

KNUTSON: 10 Burning F-1 Questions

Published in Racing
Saturday, 22 February 2020 09:00
Dan Knutson.

BLOOMINGTON, Minn. — The FIA Formula One World Championship kicks off its season March 15 at Australia’s Melbourne Grand Prix Circuit.

Here are 10 things to look out for during the record 22-race season:

1. Can anybody beat Lewis Hamilton?

He won 11 races last year on the way to his sixth world drivers’ championship. Hamilton and Mercedes, which won its sixth consecutive world constructors’ championship, are on a roll that won’t be easy to stop. He is at the absolute peak of his ability.

With the 2020 technical regulations remaining pretty much the same as in 2019, Mercedes will continue to be the team to beat.

2. Can Haas F1 bounce back?

The United States F-1 team finished an outstanding fifth in the 2018 constructors’ championship with 93 points but tumbled to ninth with a mere 28 points last year. The team spent most of last season trying to figure out why its car behaved so inconsistently.

Drivers Kevin Magnussen and Romain Grosjean had difficulties with tire transitions. The problem was eventually traced to aerodynamic stalling going into low and medium speed bends. It can’t get much worse for Haas, so its outlook bodes better for 2020.

3. Which Ferrari driver will win more races?

Four-time world champion Sebastian Vettel had a real challenge on his hands last year with sophomore Charles Leclerc. By his own admission, Vettel said his driving was below par and he had a single victory to prove that.

Leclerc started from the pole seven times but only won twice due to mistakes by both he and the team, plus the fact that Mercedes usually had a stronger race pace than Ferrari.

4. How many races will Ferrari and Red Bull win?

The teams combined for six victories last year compared to 15 by Mercedes. Ferrari’s low score was for the reasons listed above. Red Bull really only got going in the second half of the season. Both teams need to remedy these problems to win more than a six pack in 2020.

5. Which team will be the best of the rest behind Mercedes, Ferrari and Red Bull?

Renault had a fairly easy time grabbing fourth place in the constructors’ championship in 2018. But the team slipped back in 2019 while McLaren made a huge step forward. McLaren is predicting smaller gains this season while Renault believes it will make considerable improvements.

6. Will the midfield teams be competitive?

While McLaren and Renault eventually finished ahead in 2019, it was often very close among them and the rest of the midfield teams, with Toro Rosso, Racing Point, Alfa Romeo and Haas coming out on top at times. Will that tight competition continue in 2020 and will one of the other teams edge out McLaren or Renault?

7. Can Williams get out of its slump?

Williams has finished last in the constructors’ championship in 2018 and ’19 and scored a measly eight points. The team is convinced that it will do better this year, but how much better?

8. Will Honda close the final gap?

Last year, Honda earned its first F-1 victories — three in all — since 2006. It has made huge strides with its power unit, but can it consistently challenge Mercedes and Ferrari throughout the season? Also, how much will Renault close in on the other three.

9. How will the crews cope with the longer schedule?

There are a record 22 races this season, up one from last year as the Dutch Grand Prix returns for the first time since 1985 and Vietnam hosts its inaugural grand prix.

The number of testing days have been reduced slightly, but still there is a lot of traveling and days away from home for the crews. It’s not that big of  a deal for the drivers and senior team personnel who travel first class and get home more often. But it is going to put extra strain on the crew members.

10. When will teams begin their transition to working on 2021 equipment?

With major technical regulation changes coming in 2021, the teams are going to have to decide when to stop developing their 2020 cars and switch their resources to the 2021 models.

This is especially true for the smaller teams that don’t have the money to do both at the same time.

Tuchel unhappy at PSG players' partying

Published in Soccer
Saturday, 22 February 2020 08:02

Paris Saint-Germain coach Thomas Tuchel has said he is unhappy after images circulated of his players partying after the 2-1 Champions League round of 16 first leg loss at Borussia Dortmund circulated on social media.

Several PSG players shared footage of themselves celebrating Edinson Cavani, Angel Di Maria and Mauro Icardi's birthdays earlier this week.

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"I was really surprised by the video on Friday -- really surprised," Tuchel told a prematch news conference ahead of the Ligue 1 clash with Bordeaux.

"We have spoken about it internally. I prefer not to talk about it -- that will stay private, between us. "However, yes, it has been discussed. It must stay internal, though. We are unhappy with these party images."

Marquinhos, who was in attendance, said that the sharing of the images was an error of judgement and understood why it could be interpreted as disrespectful by supporters who travelled to Westfalenstadion to see the team underperform on Tuesday.

"We were filmed, there was no malicious intent, and the images were shared," the Brazil international said. "It was a mistake, which we all agree, and we are aware of it.

"We must take care as there are people who live for this club, travel for miles to support us, and then are sad when we lose.

"It was a moment to try to forget a bit about football, to spend some time together, and to take our minds off of the match."

Tuchel was defended the decision to keep Neymar out of action until the Dortmund clash after he picked up a rib problem against Montpellier at the start of February.

Neymar had said it was PSG's decision to delay his return with the Champions League clash in mind.

"Imagine if we had let Neymar play and then he got injured for three months," said Tuchel. "We cannot wait for it to happen and then say that it was our fault. We have to understand why we make these decisions."

Lo Celso VAR farce overshadows Giroud's moment

Published in Soccer
Saturday, 22 February 2020 08:11

LONDON -- It really should all be about Olivier Giroud. The France forward, called in from the cold by Chelsea manager Frank Lampard, scored one and helped make the other to inspire his team to a crucial 2-1 London derby win against Jose Mourinho's Tottenham, but thanks to another episode of VAR farce, the story of this game was about a man in a video booth rather than a guy on the pitch.

There have been plenty of VAR controversies during the system's debut season in the Premier League, but none have been quite so embarrassing, and potentially influential, as the failure to issue a red card to Spurs midfielder Giovani Lo Celso following his second-half foul on Chelsea's Cesar Azpilicueta.

Before the end of the game, Premier League sources were confirming that Professional Game Match Officials Limited (PGMOL), the body in charge of referees and VAR, had accepted that they had got it wrong. When the system designed to clear up refereeing mistakes is unable to get it right after reviewing several slow-motion replays, it points to serious flaws in the management and implementation of VAR.

"I hate to call for red cards," Chelsea manager Lampard said after the game, when asked about Lo Celso's challenge. "But that was a leg-breaker."

Lampard had a point. Certainly, 'foul' doesn't do the challenge justice. Lo Celso, whose season-long loan from Real Betis was turned into a permanent deal last month, rode a challenge from Azpilicueta on 52 minutes, but then stamped on the Spaniard's shin as he planted his foot. Azpilicueta writhed in agony on the pitch and underwent lengthy treatment, with television footage showing stud marks on his shin.

Match referee Michael Oliver had failed to spot the severity of the incident, but unsurprisingly, it was immediately reviewed by VAR. It should have been a straightforward decision for David Coote, the Video Assistant Referee for this game at VAR HQ at Stockley Park. But Coote, who has taken charge of 23 Premier League games and never issued a straight red card, inexplicably judged the challenge to be not worthy of a sending off, with the initial Premier League briefing suggesting that it was not a clear and obvious error because the VAR didn't feel there was anywhere else for Lo Celso to put his foot.

Coote's mistake only highlighted the folly of referees being advised by Mike Riley, the general manager of PGMOL, not to consult the pitchside monitor for reviews, instead leaving them to the VAR in Stockley Park. But it also led to a deluge of criticism from former players and ex-referees in the media and on social media in the minutes after Lo Celso had been let off the hook. Will we ever know whether the outcry prompted PGMOL to admit their mistake?

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Ian Wright, Rio Ferdinand, Cesc Fabregas, Robbie Savage and Dion Dublin all quickly expressed their shock at the decision, while Keith Hackett, England's former senior referee and Riley's predecessor as GM at PGMOL, went further by suggesting the current regime in charge of officials don't even know the Laws of the Game.

"Come on David Coote VAR," Hackett tweeted. "That is a red card every day. It's not a difficult decision. Lo Celso should have received a red card. Now I want to know who is the person at the centre of the PGMOL statement. I suggest that he goes to theifab.com and updates himself on LOTG [Laws of the Game]."

When a former top-level referee is questioning the competence of the current officials, it is hardly surprising that supporters, players and managers have lost faith in them and VAR. Chelsea fans chanted "F--- VAR!" during the game and Azpilicueta admitted his surprise at the failure of either Oliver or Coote to dismiss Lo Celso.

"I'm not a player that likes to be on the floor because I'm tough but it was not my fault because it was a clear stamp on my shin, I felt it straight away," Azpilicueta said. "I was surprised it was not a red card, not even a yellow card. Obviously everybody makes mistakes but when you have a lot of replays, it could be easier."

Sadly for PGMOL, this is not the first instance of VAR getting it horribly wrong this season. Just five days ago at Stamford Bridge, Manchester United captain Harry Maguire escaped a red card when VAR judged that his studs-up reaction following a tangle with Michy Batshuayi was not worthy of dismissal. Tottenham's Son Heung-Min was sent off following a similar incident with Chelsea's Antonio Rudiger earlier this season -- a decision which highlights the inconsistency shown by VAR this campaign. But the Lo Celso incident has taken it to a new low and it may prove to be a tipping point that prompts PGMOL to review their use of the system.

"Everybody knew they made a mistake," Lampard said. "We have the monitor and can view it. I was just waiting for the red to be shown because it was a tackle that endangered the player.

"It's just not good enough. Saying afterwards that they didn't get it right is not good. They took almost two minutes, but it was so wrong today and another question mark over VAR."

The question marks are growing. VAR is supposed to make the game fairer and cut down on controversy, but it is being mismanaged, with the responsibility for decisions taken away from the referee on the pitch. Changing that will not solve everything, but it will be a good start.

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Blazers guard Sharpe (shoulder) out 4-6 weeks

Blazers guard Sharpe (shoulder) out 4-6 weeks

EmailPrintOpen Extended ReactionsPortland Trail Blazers guard Shaedon Sharpe suffered a small poster...

Bronny's 'disruptive' D touted in preseason debut

Bronny's 'disruptive' D touted in preseason debut

EmailPrintOpen Extended ReactionsPALM DESERT, Calif. -- It might have come directly following his tu...

Baseball

Fresh off bye, Guardians pounce in Game 1 rout

Fresh off bye, Guardians pounce in Game 1 rout

EmailPrintOpen Extended ReactionsCLEVELAND -- For playoff teams that earn a bye into the division se...

Mets' magic strikes again in G1 win over Phils

Mets' magic strikes again in G1 win over Phils

EmailPrintOpen Extended ReactionsPHILADELPHIA -- Mark Vientos and Brandon Nimmo keyed another comeba...

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    Nactional Football Leagues
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    Federation Internationale de Speedball

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