Retired referee and former PGMOL chief Keith Hackett has spoken out about Liverpool’s equalising goal against Crystal Palace.
In their sixth match of the Premier League season, defending champions Liverpool travelled to Selhurst Park, facing a Crystal Palace side that, under Oliver Glasner, have become exceptionally hard to beat. The Eagles entered the match with a 17-game unbeaten streak, a run that includes overcoming the Reds in the Community Shield back in August.
Palace ultimately proved victorious, though it seemed that Liverpool had once more clinched a result with a stunning late goal when Federico Chiesa equalised for the Merseyside club.
Eddie Nketiah, however, who had been introduced to the game from the bench, slotted beyond Alisson in the 97th minute to secure a seismic win for his club, who are now the only unbeaten team remaining in the Premier League.
Much has, understandably, been said about either Nketiah’s winner or how bad, overall, Liverpool appeared to be against the Eagles. Retired referee Keith Hackett has, in the aftermath of the game, offered his thoughts on one particular moment of the match.
‘It Is Difficult to Understand’

The Video Assistant Referee looked at Liverpool’s equalising goal, as it appeared that star forward Mohamed Salah’s arm was close to the ball as it came into the box, the Egyptian having jumped to try and meet the pass. Discussing the incident, Hackett said:
“It is difficult to understand when you see on video replay the deliberate handball from Salah, who has made his body shape larger, reaching out to the sky. He comes into contact with the ball, but the referee, first of all, doesn’t see it.
“Then VAR checks it and doesn’t come to the right decision. This is handball. Something isn’t right. There is a relationship problem, or a technical problem, because the video evidence is clear and obvious that a handball incident took place. It should be penalised. Full stop.”
Palace were able to push on and win the game, but they would have been immensely hard done by had the match ended in a draw. Not only for their performance, but as Hackett highlighted, with the manner in which Liverpool scored their goal.
Slot’s side will no doubt look to swiftly bounce back from this game, but given some of their performances so far this season, it is perhaps surprising that it took this long for Liverpool’s perfect Premier League record to come to an end.
Big Clubs get decisions going their way every time that Palace play them and this is nothing short of corruption as once again today Palace had to beat 13 men.
It seems as if these inept officials are in awe of these Big Clubs and so let them run the match and get decisions that Palace could only dream about getting given in their favour.
The fact that Palace have only lost 4 of their last 18 games against the Big 6 Clubs speaks volumes for just how good we are and the threat that we are to the Big 6 domination and their guaranteed millions from constantly qualifying for European Football.
18 game unbeaten Palace are now genuine title contenders having only lost 4 games in 2025 and we fear nobody
