LONDON, England (CMC) — Reggae Boy and West Ham United forward Michail Antonio says the video assistant referee (VAR) system needs to be scrapped.

His call came after West Ham were controversially denied a 90th-minute equaliser at Chelsea last Saturday after VAR intervened.

Referees’ body PGMOL accepted that decision — and a second VAR call in the Newcastle United versus Crystal Palace match — was incorrect.

“It was a madness, that’s what I am going to call it. An actual madness,” said 32-year-old Antonio, who scored West Ham’s goal.

Speaking on the Footballer’s Football Podcast on BBC Sounds, he said: “I have said this many times. It needs to be binned.”

Maxwell Cornet thought he had equalised at 2-2 for West Ham at Stamford Bridge but, after being told to look at the monitor by VAR, referee Andrew Madley decided there was a foul on goalkeeper Edouard Mendy by Jarrod Bowen and reversed his decision to award a goal.

West Ham Manager David Moyes called the decision “scandalous”.

“As a player we all knew it [the incident] was nothing,” Antonio said.

“It is all about opinions — about the referee’s opinion, about the fourth official’s opinion and about the opinion of whoever is watching.

“If the referee makes a decision, then there is another person who goes ‘that might not be the right decision’. He goes to the referee ‘you might have to have another look at that’.

“He is putting doubt in the referee’s mind when he is already sure about the decision he has made.

“You are spending all this money on VAR [which is in its fourth full Premier League season after it was introduced in 2019] for things to still go wrong.”

Football matches in England have been postponed this weekend as a mark of respect after the death of Queen Elizabeth II on Thursday at the age of 96.