Manchester United are furious at referee Stuart Attwell’s decision not to award a penalty when Amad was fouled in their 2-2 draw with Bournemouth and plan to lodge a formal complaint with PGMOL.
Harry Maguire was sent off in Friday night’s match between Manchester United and Bournemouth (Image: Warren Little, Getty Images)
Manchester United are furious at the decision not to award Amad a penalty against Bournemouth when they felt he was brought down and will lodge a formal complaint with PGMOL on Saturday.
United believe the winger was blatantly dragged to the grass by Adrian Trufaat inside the penalty area shortly after being awarded a spot-kick for a similar incident in which Alex Jimenez pulled Matheus Cunha’s shirt.
To make matters worse, Bournemouth marched straight up the pitch and beat Ryan Christie to equalize, but late in the game Harry Maguire was given a penalty for challenging Evanison, which was almost identical to the incident with Amado and Truffert, but Stuart Attwell overruled this. Then Maguire saw red.
The Manchester Evening News reported that United officials were “furious” over what they deemed to be another damaging VAR error, and were confused why similar penalty incidents in the same match were treated differently.
Attwell’s decision to send Maguire means United will be stripped of the 33-year-old centre-half against Leeds United.
read more: Bournemouth manager strongly disagrees with Michael Carrick over Manchester United controversyread more: Michael Carrick slams referee for ‘astonishing’ call during Manchester United draw
Manager Michael Carrick said he thought the choice not to award Amad a penalty after Friday night’s 2-2 draw at the Vitality Stadium was “surprising” and had the support of club officials, who said they would now lodge a formal complaint with PGMOL chief Howard Webb.
United will also question why the game was extended for nine minutes when 10 men were trying to protect the draw. Club leaders are baffled as to how match officials came to the decision to add that extra time, and feel excessive stoppage time is a pattern that has been repeated throughout the season.
United’s anger towards match officials has been simmering for some time this season, with United recently raising concerns about PGMOL in the wake of the Bournemouth ruling. The team are furious that Brentford defender Nathan Collins was not dismissed after denying a clear goal-scoring chance at the G Tech Community Stadium earlier this season, an incident similar to Maguire’s sending off on Friday.
There were also complaints about not being awarded a spot-kick against Wolves and the decision to chalk out Lisandro Martínez’s goal in a 2-2 stalemate at Burnley in January, with Attwell returning to referee the match against Turf Moor. After the draw with Bournemouth, Carrick said: “My first (thought) was that he definitely got one of them wrong, because he gave away one penalty for the same thing as he didn’t give one penalty for a two-armed glove.”
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“So he gave the one to Matthäus, but he didn’t give the second one to Amad. I think it’s about the same, but the fact is that someone in the box has two hands and they go over there and control the ball. For me it’s two penalties, but it will be interesting to see which one he admits was wrong, the one we got and the one we didn’t get.”
“And that’s a big moment. And you don’t give it away and they go down to the other side and score and it takes a bigger penalty to turn it over just because they scored, when in fact it’s a penalty, and if they’ve already given a penalty it should be a penalty.”
Harry Maguire was sent off for knocking down Evanilsson (Image: Warren Little, Getty Images)
“Really, it’s a little puzzling to understand. And with them scoring, the game flipped a little bit and changed. We defended with 10 men after that, and we played really well. And the guys came off the bench and finished the game really strong.”
“So it was a big plus for us to finally get the points. We saw them winning in the second half, so we accepted that, but one of the penalties was surprising. I have to say one of them must be wrong.”
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