Former Premier League referee Mike Dean failed to correct a mistake in a match to save his friend and fellow official Anthony Taylor from being overly ‘heartbroken’.
Before Chelsea could have felt Harry Kane’s late equalizer, they should have been awarded a penalty after Christian Romero pulled Mark Cucurella’s hair.
Dean admitted the “really bad call” and didn’t send Taylor over to review it.
“I missed the stupid game in the Chelsea-Tottenham game, which was pathetic from my point of view,” Dean said. Simon Jordan’s Up Front podcast.
“It’s one of them, if I get my time again, what am I going to do? I’m going to send Anthony (Taylor) to the screen. I think I would have known if I had sent him to the screen…Both managers warned, he had it. It’s a hell of a game, it was a tough game. From start to finish.
“I said to Anthony afterwards, ‘I didn’t want to send you to the screen after what happened in the match.'”
“I didn’t want to send him on because he’s a fellow and a referee and I guess I didn’t want to send him on because I didn’t want more grief than he was already going through.”
Dean became a VAR specialist in the Premier League last season after holding his whistle at the end of the 2021-22 season after referring more than 550 top-flight matches.
He was taken off VAR duty for two months after the Stamford Bridge incident.
Wirral later gave birth to Dean He ended his 28-year career As a professional official because being in the VAR hot seat was something he ultimately “feared”.
“It was a big mistake,” Dean added. “If they don’t score from a corner kick it won’t be a big deal.”
“But I knew perfectly well that I would be quitting the following week. I asked for some time off because it didn’t work for me.
“I was in the car on Friday and I was feeling scared on Saturday. I was thinking, ‘I hope nothing happens.’ I was getting scared when I sat in the chair.”
