Liverpool vs Nottingham Forest: Iraola fumes over three-minute delay

Liverpool's 2-2 draw with Nottingham Forest at Anfield was shaped by more than the late penalty swings. Andoni Iraola said the planned triple substitution of Ryan Gravenberch, Kostas Tsimikas and Rio Ngumoha was held up for about three minutes while the board caused problems for fourth official Tim Robinson.

He said Forest had already taken advantage by then. The ball went out of play three times while Liverpool waited on the sideline, and Iraola argued the changes had been ready for the previous two or three stoppages before the goal.

The substitution delay

Iraola's main complaint was the wait itself. "But more than this we complained about the subs. We had to wait about three minutes," he said to BBC Sport, before adding: "A professional fourth official cannot take three minutes. We'd already given him the subs two or three minutes before."

Stephen Warnock backed that view on BBC, saying: "It would've completely stopped the play. It's appalling from the fourth official."

The source of the delay is still the board issue, and Iraola said, "He was having an issue with the board, I don't know if it was not working." Forest then took a quick throw-in from the third stoppage and won a penalty to retake the lead.

Wirtz's disallowed equaliser

The other flashpoint came when Florian Wirtz thought he had levelled the game, only for VAR to rule the goal out after Jeremie Frimpong was checked for offside in the build-up. The Premier League Match Centre said Frimpong was in an offside position and recommended the goal be disallowed.

Ally McCoist's read on the replay was similar. "When the ball came into Jeremie Frimpong, it looked close, he's just slightly offside," he said on TNT Sports.

Wirtz still finished with one assist in two Premier League appearances for Liverpool, and his 6.28 rating in the draw showed he was involved even if the equaliser did not stand. Alisson's 6.05 rating and one save summed up a game where the key moments came from incidents rather than control.

The result leaves the penalty argument and the substitution delay hanging over the match, but the clearest fact is simple: Liverpool spent about three minutes waiting to make a change, and VAR later ruled out Wirtz's goal at Liverpool vs Nottingham Forest.