Shakhtar Donetsk's reserve goalkeeper Andriy Pyatov has spoken out about refereeing in crucial matches of the Ukrainian Premier League.
Andriy Pyatov- Andrii, the championship race has reached the home stretch. What are your impressions of this challenging season in general?
- This season's championship differs from many previous ones in that there is a serious fight on all floors of the standings, including for the championship. I think it is interesting for the fans to watch this fight. We have not seen such tension in our championship for a long time. We will try to do everything in the remaining three rounds to maintain our advantage and win the championship. Now, in wartime, this title is more important to us than ever. The main thing is to have a fair fight.
- It was reported that in order to reduce the likelihood of refereeing errors and, as you say, to create equal conditions for fair play and determine the champion, the VAR system will be used in the matches of the leaders until the end of the season. In the 27th round, VAR was already in place at the matches between Shakhtar and Dnipro-1. Did it make the referees' job easier?
- Of course, VAR helps to avoid controversial situations on the pitch and significantly improves the quality of refereeing. Remember how many controversial, dubious 11-metre penalties have been awarded without VAR recently. But VAR does not solve all problems. There are episodes that we see on the pitch, but, let's just say, VAR's work does not apply to them. For example, yesterday, the decision of referee Yuriy Ivanov attracted attention when, in the 80th minute of the Dnipro-1 vs Kolos match, with the score tied 1-1, he awarded a free kick in the Kolos penalty area towards the goal of the Kovalivka team for the goalkeeper's delay. I have been playing football for over 20 years. As a goalkeeper, I was outraged by this decision. The referees are loyal to the six-second rule - you can find several similar episodes in every match. Sometimes they say: "Put the ball in!" And here, the referee created a scoring chance for Dnipro-1 out of the blue at the right time when the score was tied. It seems that the referee was waiting, looking for this episode, used the rules and created a goal for Dnipro-1. It was not Dnipro-1 who created it, but the referee. If I'm not mistaken, this is the same referee who awarded a strange penalty to Ingulets in a match against the same Dnipro-1 a few rounds ago, also with the score tied. I'm not saying that we should ignore the violations - the rules are the rules. But such violations are recorded once every ten years. And when it is done in the championship race in favour of the team claiming to win the championship, with the score tied 10 minutes before the end of the match, it causes outrage. As you can see, in such moments, VAR does not help the referee make adequate decisions. I would like to see the championship played out in a fair fight in the remaining rounds, and the referees did not interfere with this.
