Oleg Matveev: "The level of officiating in the UPL has dropped. They give mythical penalties and goals are not counted...".

Oleg Matveev, a former player of Kyiv Dynamo and Shakhtar Donetsk, has commented on the topic of officiating in the Ukrainian championship.

"Speaking comprehensively, there are certainly more mistakes made by the referees now than there were before the war. It is difficult to talk about the causes, but the overall level is somewhat lower. They give mythical penalties and goals are not counted.

Unfortunately, VAR doesn't always help, but it takes the edge off the tension and the constant discussions about where the penalty kick was and where it wasn't. We would like to see more of the key games at the end of the season being played with VAR. This will make it possible to avoid scandals.

What about the matches at the bottom of the table? Teams are fighting for survival and they don't have VAR. We should either use it in all matches of the tour or not use it at all. When I worked at Mariupol, we played almost without VAR," Vesti.ua quoted Matveev as saying.