---
title: "Premier League admit massive refereeing blunder against Tottenham vs Sunderland"
canonical: "https://readtottenham.com/2026/04/24/premier-league-admit-massive-refereeing-blunder-against-tottenham-vs-sunderland/"
type: "post"
language: "en-GB"
author: "Vishal Subramanian"
section: "Tottenham News"
published: "2026-04-24T11:48:14Z"
modified: "2026-04-24T11:48:15Z"
---

# Premier League admit massive refereeing blunder against Tottenham vs Sunderland

At a glance

- Brian Brobbey should have been sent off
- Dutchman’s push missed by referee and VAR
- Romero suffered season-ending injury after incident

Tottenham’s Premier League clash against Sunderland was Roberto De Zerbi’s first for the club, but it will be remembered for all the wrong reasons.

Nordi Mukiele scored the solitary goal of the game in the second half as the North London side fell to a 1-0 defeat.

The result deepened Tottenham’s relegation woes as they now find themselves occupying 18th place in the Premier League table.

Rob Jones’ refereeing performance at the Stadium of Light came under the spotlight on the night. And now, the Premier League’s key match incidents (KMI) panel has ruled that Tottenham were on the wrong end of a key decision.

## Brian Brobbey should have been sent off vs Tottenham

In the first half, Brobbey received a yellow card for an elbow on Pedro Porro.

Earlier in the game, he committed a rash challenge on Romero, but that incident went unpunished.

**Read More:** [Tottenham have already been sent massive Sebastian Kehl warning](https://readtottenham.com/2026/04/24/tottenham-have-already-been-sent-massive-sebastian-kehl-warning/)

After Mukiele’s opener, Brobbey was in the thick of the action again. As he chased a ball into the Tottenham box, both Romero and Antonin Kinsky got in his way to beat him to it.

And the Dutch international used both his hands to push Romero, which led to a nasty collision between the two Tottenham players and, in turn, a lengthy stoppage.

> Sunderland striker Brian Brobbey should have been sent off against Tottenham, the Premier League's KMI Panel has said.\
> \
> Brobbey pushed Cristian Romero into keeper Antonin Kinsky but escaped a second yellow.\
> \
> Romero suffered a season-ending knee injury.\
> 👇[https://t.co/4bauRybb6B](https://t.co/4bauRybb6B)
>
> — Dale Johnson (@DaleJohnsonBBC) [April 24, 2026](https://twitter.com/DaleJohnsonBBC/status/2047624947925766175?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw)

Kinsky got back on his feet with a bandage on his head, but Romero was forced off the pitch with a season-ending MCL injury as he walked away in tears.

It was obvious to most people in the ground that Brobbey had committed a foul, but referee Rob Jones turned a blind eye to it, while VAR didn’t intervene.

And now, the KMI panel voted 3:2 that the decision by Jones was a mistake, with the majority view being that ‘there is a two-handed push which is an unnecessarily reckless action’.

## Jones’ performance was a farce

[We covered earlier on Read Tottenham that Jones’ refereeing performance was an absolute shambles](https://readtottenham.com/2026/04/13/tottenham-were-abysmal-but-referee-rob-jones-played-big-part-in-painful-sunderland-defeat/) on the night.

He missed a lot of simple decisions and it can’t just be written off as an occupational hazard as the stakes are high for De Zerbi and co.

**Read More:** [Tottenham defender told he doesn’t have a ‘brain’ in astonishing criticism](https://readtottenham.com/2026/04/24/tottenham-defender-told-he-doesnt-have-a-brain-in-astonishing-criticism/)

If Brobbey had been sent off, Sunderland would have played around 30 minutes of football with 10 men, which Tottenham could have used to their advantage.

Every point matters now in the relegation battle and if Spurs do go down, Jones certainly won’t be a popular man in this part of the world.

​