Updated 14:24, 09 May 2026<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/span><\/div>\n
<\/p>\n\n
\n
\nCole Palmer thought he had given Chelsea the lead(Image: Getty Images)<\/cite><\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/button><\/p>\n
Chelsea were left frustrated after Cole Palmer’s second-half goal was ruled out for offside.<\/p>\n
Enzo Fernandez had cancelled out Ryan Gravenberch’s opener in the first half, though there was some confusion as to whether or not Wesley Fofana had got a touch on his free-kick. Calum McFarlane’s side then thought they had taken the lead in the 49th minute at Anfield.<\/p>\n
Quick thinking from Moises Caicedo saw him thread a pass through to Marc Cucurella inside the left flank, and his pass across the face of the six-yard box caused chaos. Indeed, after Virgil van Dijk almost put the ball in his own net, Palmer thumped home the rebound, much to the delight of the 3,000 travelling Chelsea fans.<\/p>\n
However, VAR had a closer look at the incident and decided to rule the goal out for an offside from Cucurella in the build-up. Replays showed that the ex-Brighton and Getafe man was leaning beyond the last man when Caicedo played his pass, and therefore in an offside position.<\/p>\n
Moments after the goal was ruled out, the Premier League posted an update on X and said: ” #LIVCHE \u2013 49′ VAR OVERTURN VAR checked the referee’s call of goal – and established that Cucurella was in an offside position in the build-up and recommended that the goal was disallowed.”<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n\n
\n
\nCole Palmer scored but his goal was ruled out for offside(Image: Getty Images)<\/cite><\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/button><\/div>\n
Chelsea started the second half on the front foot and had that Palmer goal disallowed, but it was then Liverpool’s turn to have the ball in the back of the net. A cross from the right was headed back across goal by Cody Gakpo and Curtis Jones was there to prod home from close-range.<\/p>\n
But the offside flag was raised straight from the off, as Gakpo was adjudged to have been in front of the last man when the initial pass was made. VAR, as they did for Palmer’s offside goal, had another look at the incident again but agreed with the on-field decision from the assistant referee.<\/p>\n
Liverpool then began to regain some control in the contest with the Reds having a number of opportunities to take the lead for a second time. Dominik Szoboszlai stung Filip Jorgensen’s palms before hitting the base of the post, and Virgil van Dijk hit the crossbar after meeting a corner from the right.<\/p>\n
McFarlane’s Blues, however, continued to look a threat on the counter-attack with Cucurella the continue orchestrator of their good work on the afternoon. He had a fine game on the left and looked dangerous every single time he went forward, backed up by full-back Jorell Hato.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Chelsea thought they had taken the lead early in the second half against Liverpool, but…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6619,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pagelayer_contact_templates":[],"_pagelayer_content":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6618","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-chelsea"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6618","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6618"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6618\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/6619"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6618"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6618"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6618"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}