Should Sunderland be higher up the table?
Sunderland manager Roy Keane seems to think so:
“Five major decisions have gone against us.
We keep talking about fairness but the decisions certainly haven’t gone our way. You’re looking at six points lost.
…
I find it very hard to take some of the comments that come my way from referees and officials and generally the attitude to our football club has left me very disappointed.
The attitude seems to be ‘It’s only Sunderland’. All we’re asking for is fairness in the game and this football club is not getting that at the moment.”
He’s right about the Derby game – Sunderland deserved to win that one and were denied by a poor refereeing decision.
But what about the incorrect decisions that have gone in Sunderland’s favor? Are we only going to look at the points Sunderland have lost and not the points Sunderland have gained?
Keano, I respect you a lot, but maybe you should consider this and this as well.
Roy Keane is mostly right. Sunderland have had some shocking decisions go against them like the one at Derby. They had a perfectly good injury time winner against Villa ruled out and then lost to Reading the next week when the ball didn’t cross the line.
Add to that decisions such as not getting stonewalled penalties at Birmingham and Liverpool, Prica having a good goal dissallowed against Birmingham at the SoL and Emile Heskey scoring for Wigan when clearly onside.
There have been a couple go with Sunderland, most notably Stern John scoring against Birmingham while the keeper was fouled, but the above mentioned penalty would have meant the same result. The only other possible game-changing decision that has went for Sunderland was against Fulham, when they had a goal dissallowed for a foul on the defender but even that could have went either way, and it is clear to see why the referee gave the decision.
*the Heskey point above should read ‘offside’
No.
Another week, another refereeing decision costs Sunderland.