According to reports, VAR officials John Brooks and Dan Robathan were forced to evacuate the VAR room at Stockley Park in West London due to the alarm.

Nottingham Forest, managed by Nuno Espírito Santo, led 2-0 at halftime with goals from Elliot Anderson and Chris Wood. However, VAR remained inactive at the start of the second half.

The Premier League confirmed the incident in a statement: “The match will proceed without VAR until further notice due to a fire alarm activation in the VAR room at Stockley Park.”

The VAR system was down for approximately eight minutes in the second half before normal operations resumed. A follow-up tweet from the Premier League stated: “VAR is back online and operational.”

Fortunately, no controversial incidents occurred during the downtime. Fans found the situation amusing, with one tweeting: “For about a minute, we had real freedom!”