World Cup: Graeme Souness and Gary Neville slam VAR for controversial Japan goal which eliminated Germany

Graeme Souness and Gary Neville have slammed FIFA for not showing the world a clear image of Japan’s controversial second goal in their 2-1 win against Spain that knocked Germany out of the 2022 World Cup.

Ao Tanaka’s surprising second goal, which came just two minutes after Japan’s equaliser from Ritsu Doan, was initially chalked off as the ball appeared to go out of play when Kaoru Mitoma put the cross in.

However, after a long wait, VAR overturned the decision and awarded the goal to Japan – with side-on television pictures inconclusive as to whether the ball did go over the line.

Rules state that if the curvature of the ball is over any part of the line, it is still in play.

“Every television studio, pundit, everyone who’s got an interest in this World Cup will be wanting to see this picture [from above],” Souness told ITV.

“To us it looked like the ball went out here in the stadium, the pictures we have seen it looks like the ball is out.

“Why is FIFA not showing us something so controversial, that has cost the Germans dearly, why are they not showing it to us?

“This is not subjective. It’s black and white. Show us the pictures, FIFA!

“The longer they don’t produce a picture, you’re thinking there is something untoward going on.”

Germany’s 4-2 win over Costa Rica meant Japan needed to beat Spain. Without the controversial second goal, Japan would have been level on points with Germany but out of the World Cup on goal difference.

Gary Neville did not believe in any conspiracy theories, but criticised the use of VAR during the tournament in Qatar, which was underlined on Thursday night.

“From the very first day of this tournament we haven’t been able to communicate big decisions really clearly to fans at home, and even to us… how these decisions are being overturned,” said Neville.

“VAR have seen something that we have not seen around the world. We can’t get an angle of what the VAR officials have seen to overturn the decision.

“We have moved on in terms of technology, where we have hundreds of cameras in stadiums where we can’t miss anything.

“Yet we’ve gone backwards in terms of demonstrating clear decisions. Someone in that VAR studio has seen something which has absolutely categorically overturned it.”