The only important question over the penalty decision that effectively won the 2019 Champions League final was over intent – but not regarding Moussa Sissoko. Whether he meant to handle the ball was utterly irrelevant to the laws, which indicated referee Damir Skomina had made absolutely the correct decision on Saturday night.

What is much more relevant to the rules – and the very future of the game – is whether Sadio Mane intended it. Did he mean to hit Sissoko’s arm with that chip?

If so, it may prove a deeply meaningful moment for football, way beyond just winning the sport’s greatest club trophy. And even if he didn’t, it points to a huge potential issue for the future, as well a possible unintended consequence that such changes to laws of the game can bring.

It has already meant that, even if the tactically smothered nature of a negative match was out of keeping with the raucous football from the Champions League season that built up to it, it was fitting in perhaps the most important way because of how the final was settled by one of the other main themes of the campaign. It was just the latest, and most high-profile and high-stakes, handball decision.

That theme started in the last 16, after Head of Uefa Referees Roberto Rosetti specifically told officials that he wanted this type of offence – where a player has their arm out so wide it does not allow the ball to pass – to be picked up on and punished. Again, intent is irrelevant. It is about players not gaining an advantage from an “unnatural” position – where a body part you cannot use in the game interferes with play.

Best photos from the Champions League final: Tottenham 0-2 Liverpool Show all 100 1 /100 Best photos from the Champions League final: Tottenham 0-2 Liverpool Best photos from the Champions League final: Tottenham 0-2 Liverpool Champions League final The story of Liverpool's Champions League victory Getty Best photos from the Champions League final: Tottenham 0-2 Liverpool Champions League final The ultimate prize in European football sits pitchside before kick-off AFP/Getty Images Best photos from the Champions League final: Tottenham 0-2 Liverpool Champions League final Liverpool fans before kick-off EPA Best photos from the Champions League final: Tottenham 0-2 Liverpool Champions League final Tottenham supporters makes themselves heard AP Best photos from the Champions League final: Tottenham 0-2 Liverpool Champions League final Steven Gerrard on punditry duty REUTERS Best photos from the Champions League final: Tottenham 0-2 Liverpool Champions League final Mohamed Salah warms up on the pitch AFP/Getty Images Best photos from the Champions League final: Tottenham 0-2 Liverpool Champions League final Harry Kane is a surprise inclusion from the start, having not played since the quarter-finals nearly two months ago Getty Images Best photos from the Champions League final: Tottenham 0-2 Liverpool Champions League final The Spurs players limber up ahead of the game Tottenham Hotspur FC via Getty I Best photos from the Champions League final: Tottenham 0-2 Liverpool Champions League final Spurs fans begin to fill their end of the stadium Getty Images Best photos from the Champions League final: Tottenham 0-2 Liverpool Champions League final Liverpool fans in full voice at the other end EPA Best photos from the Champions League final: Tottenham 0-2 Liverpool Champions League final The pre-match show lights up the Madrid evening PA Best photos from the Champions League final: Tottenham 0-2 Liverpool Champions League final Imagine Dragons take centre stage Getty Images Best photos from the Champions League final: Tottenham 0-2 Liverpool Champions League final The players emerge for kick-off Getty Images Best photos from the Champions League final: Tottenham 0-2 Liverpool Champions League final A minute's applause for the former Arsenal footballer Jose Antonio Reyes, who died on Friday in a road traffic accident AFP/Getty Images Best photos from the Champions League final: Tottenham 0-2 Liverpool Champions League final Spurs players embrace each other one last time AFP/Getty Images Best photos from the Champions League final: Tottenham 0-2 Liverpool Champions League final Liverpool get the game under way... REUTERS Best photos from the Champions League final: Tottenham 0-2 Liverpool Champions League final ... and 26 seconds later, they have a penalty when Moussa Sissoko is adjudged to have handled the ball REUTERS Best photos from the Champions League final: Tottenham 0-2 Liverpool Champions League final Referee Damir Skomina checks with VAR but the decision stands Getty Images Best photos from the Champions League final: Tottenham 0-2 Liverpool Champions League final epa07618794 Sadio Mane of Liverpool celebrates after Liverpool have been awarded a penalty during the UEFA Champions League final between Tottenham Hotspur and Liverpool FC at the Wanda Metropolitano stadium in Madrid, Spain, 01 June 2019. EPA/Emilio Naranjo Emilio Naranjo EPA Best photos from the Champions League final: Tottenham 0-2 Liverpool Champions League final Mohamed Salah steps up for Liverpool Getty Images Best photos from the Champions League final: Tottenham 0-2 Liverpool Champions League final MADRID, SPAIN - JUNE 01: Mohamed Salah of Liverpool scores the opening goalduring the UEFA Champions League Final between Tottenham Hotspur and Liverpool at Estadio Wanda Metropolitano on June 01, 2019 in Madrid, Spain. (Photo by Matthias Hangst/Getty Images) Matthias Hangst Getty Images Best photos from the Champions League final: Tottenham 0-2 Liverpool Champions League final Liverpool's Egyptian forward Mohamed Salah looks on during the UEFA Champions League final football match between Liverpool and Tottenham Hotspur at the Wanda Metropolitano Stadium in Madrid on June 1, 2019. 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PRESS ASSOCIATION Photo. Picture date: Saturday June 1, 2019. See PA story SOCCER Final. Photo credit should read: Joe Giddens/PA Wire. RESTRICTIONS: Editorial use only in permitted publications not devoted to any team, player or match. No commercial use. Stills use only - no video simulation. No commercial association without UEFA permission. please contact PA Images for further information. Joe Giddens PA Best photos from the Champions League final: Tottenham 0-2 Liverpool Champions League final MADRID, SPAIN - JUNE 01: Divock Origi of Liverpool scores his sides second goal during the UEFA Champions League Final between Tottenham Hotspur and Liverpool at Estadio Wanda Metropolitano on June 01, 2019 in Madrid, Spain. 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Liverpool won 2-0. EPA/Emilio Naranjo Emilio Naranjo EPA Best photos from the Champions League final: Tottenham 0-2 Liverpool Champions League final The Liverpool plans react at the end of the game AP Best photos from the Champions League final: Tottenham 0-2 Liverpool Champions League final Liverpool's Georginio Wijnaldum celebrates at the final whistle after the UEFA Champions League Final at the Wanda Metropolitano, Madrid. PRESS ASSOCIATION Photo. Picture date: Saturday June 1, 2019. See PA story SOCCER Final. Photo credit should read: Peter Byrne/PA Wire. RESTRICTIONS: Editorial use only in permitted publications not devoted to any team, player or match. No commercial use. Stills use only - no video simulation. No commercial association without UEFA permission. please contact PA Images for further information. 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There are two potential consequences of this, though, that the Sissoko moment crystallised. The first is that the most innocuous and – yes – natural of movements could become disproportionately influential.

If a player is merely pointing at an area he wants a teammate to run into – as they so often do, and as many felt Sissoko was doing on Saturday – it can give away a penalty. That is increasingly concerning because it is in itself so much more basic than the more difficult debate over how you “naturally” jump. It is really as organic a part of the game as picking the team, or choosing where to play the ball. The same applies to moments that bring in unconscious body language like demanding a pass, imploring a teammate to do something, or just remonstrating.

And it gives rise to the most important element of all of this, which makes the question of Mane’s intent so crucial. Will we now see players actually alter their attacking intentions, and try to hit the hands or the arms of the opposition?

Moussa Sissoko protests his innocence as Sadio Mane appeals (EPA)

Why not? It makes perfect sense to, but may lead to an imperfect aspect of the game. More matches might well be decided by referee guidance that doesn’t fundamentally promote in-play attacking; that instead encourages a more cynical calculation, that can target minor movements that wouldn’t usually have any kind of bearing on the actual football.

It would increase the effect of basic chance on the game, and potentially affect the focus of play. It could increase the element of chaos, maybe to a level of farce against what is actually desired from such rules.

Normally negligible movements could now have major impact, and cause the defending team to second-guess themselves in a way that doesn’t contribute to complete commitment to ‘play’, while causing the attacking side to constrain themselves and don’t necessarily bring proactive football.

This is the genuine danger of this move away from concentrating on intent with handball, as was the case for referees throughout most of the past few decades, and towards just the basic position of the arm.

“There will be some controversy over the decision but that is largely because people are still adjusting to how the handball rule is now interpreted,” former referee Keith Hackett said in a Sunday Telegraph column. “That will change as people get used to this sort of evolution in the Laws of the Game and we saw that with Liverpool’s second.”

But have attackers already got used to it, to maybe bring even more controversy?