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Kenny Miller issues 'Unbelievable' verdict after Abdallah Sima goal in Rangers win v Livingston
Kenny Miller was left stunned by the VAR decision to allow Abdallah Sima’s goal to stand in Rangers 4-0 win over Livingston in the Viaplay Cup quarter-final.
The Gers claimed an impressive win with a strong performance at Ibrox as Sima opened the scoring, followed by goals from Ridvan Yilmaz, a de Lucas own goal and Ryan Jack.
But there was controversy for the opener as Sima seemingly pushed defender Jamie Brandon in the build-up to the goal, and Miller was baffled by VAR’s decision not to rule the goal out while on commentary for BBC Sportsound.
“I can’t help but think VAR will have a look at this because Sima clearly pushed Jamie Brandon and just edges him out of it,” he said, as quoted by Football Scotland (28 September).
“There’s no doubt about it there’s a push there. It’s so clear isn’t it? I think VAR has a look at this.”
Once it was shared that VAR had found no issue with the goal Miller simply responded with, “unbelievable”.
Harsh
As Sima was rushing through to chase the pass from Ridvan, it was clear that the defender’s only intention was to win a foul.
The ball was going towards the goal rather than out of play, and he knew that he was going to struggle to clear it away under such pressure.
That means he was looking for a foul and any sort of contact meant he was going to go down to the ground to get out of trouble, and the referee was smart to it and didn’t give the foul.
VAR would have seen that and known, and we have to remember that football is still a contact sport. Contact doesn’t automatically equal a foul and that was the case here.
Sima did the right thing by playing to the whistle and putting the ball in the back of the net first and asking questions after. A foul would have been harsh, and realistically it made no difference to the result. No doubt we’ll be hearing about this for weeks now though.
In other Rangers news, first-team ace in talks to sign new Ibrox deal.