Lardot: 'Referee made the correct decision on Cvetkovic's goal'
WEDNESDAY, 11 NOVEMBER 2026, 19:00 - lajoya
GAMES Cvetkovic's equaliser two days ago sparked debate. The decision by the officials to let the phase continue was strongly challenged by Hans Vanaken and Ivan Leko. Yet refereeing chief Jonathan Lardot is clear. The day after the match, on the DAZN programme *Under Review*, Lardot defended referee Jasper Vergoote and the VAR.
“I agree with the referee's decision and with the VAR's decision,” he began. “We analyse this situation as one and the same restart of play.” According to him, the key to the interpretation lies in the fact that the first foul is committed by Brandon Mechele. “Mechele pulls on his opponent and throws him off balance. After that, Cvetkovic also holds his shirt, but it all happens within the same duel,” he explains. For the head of Belgian refereeing, it would be wrong to split the phase into separate, isolated sequences. “At normal speed, you can clearly see it is one phase.
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Continue reading The referee assessed that correctly on the spot, and I fully back his decision.” Lardot goes even further and points to the consequences Mechele's first foul could have had. “If the referee had whistled for Mechele's first foul, Anderlecht would have been awarded a free kick and Mechele would have received a red card. It was a clear goalscoring opportunity. The fact that a goal ultimately came from that phase confirms that analysis, too.” Responding to criticism from Bruges, Lardot therefore stresses the importance of looking at the action as a whole. “If you look at some moments separately, you can indeed conclude there was a foul by Cvetkovic. But those events are inseparable: two fouls are committed within one or two seconds. In situations like this, the referee's interpretation of it as one phase is decisive. And I fully support his judgement.”
