VAR officials involved in Liverpool vs Tottenham error stood down for 'further games' as time out extended

Darren England and Dan Cook have been stood down for another round of fixtures amid the ongoing VAR controversy after Liverpool's 2-1 defeat to Tottenham.

Criticism of VAR and the referees' body PGMOL has reached fever pitch after Liverpool were denied a rightful goal in their defeat at Tottenham on Saturday.

According to Sky Sports, VAR officials England and Cook were originally replaced for two games after VAR wrongly disallowed Luis Diaz' first-half goal, but their hiatus has now been extended to a further round of fixtures.

Meanwhile, Simon Hooper, who refereed the game, will be the VAR official for Everton's Premier League encounter against Bournemouth this weekend.

Immediately after Liverpool's defeat to Tottenham, PGMOL, the governing body for referees, admitted the decision to rule out the Diaz's goal was "a significant human error".

A day later, Liverpool released a statement saying the explanation was "unacceptable" and that "sporting integrity has been undermined".

The club called for a "review with full transparency", adding that they will "explore the range of options available given the clear need for escalation and resolution".

The Reds then asked PGMOL for audio of discussions between the match officials in Saturday's 2-1 defeat at Tottenham.

PGMOL recognised the two VAR officials, Cook and England, failed to act correctly after Diaz's 34th-minute strike was wrongly ruled out for offside. The game was at 0-0 at that point, with Liverpool down to 10 men after Curtis Jones had been sent off.

In a statement PGMOL said the Diaz incident "was a clear and obvious factual error and should have resulted in the goal being awarded through VAR intervention".

It has been widely reported that referees' chief Howard Webb has spoken to Liverpool about the incident.

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