Nottingham Forest manager Steve Cooper has blasted the VAR for not awarding a penalty for Harry Maguire’s blatant hand ball inside the box.
The England defender picked up a yellow card early on in the game and could easily have been sent of a few minutes later when he handled the ball inside his own box.
This was followed by huge appeal for a penalty by fans and players but in vain. The VAR had a look at it and decided to stick with the referee’s original decision.
And Steve Cooper was fuming at the officials in his post match interview. He told Sky Sports (via The Mirror):
“Harry Maguire’s was a definitely penalty (for handball).”
“Then a second yellow card and red. A terrible decision.
“How have VAR not picked up on that? Another call and apology from them then, which won’t help.”
“The Harry Maguire one, for me, is a really poor error.”
“The referee should see it and I understand why he hasn’t because of the amount of players and the angle, but why VAR haven’t is not right in my opinion.
“It’s another big moment that is going to have scrutiny on VAR and obviously there’s been a lot of not positive decisions over the past few weeks. It’s not the reason why we lost the game – although it could have been a penalty and a second yellow for Harry Maguire, we could have scored the penalty and gone one up.”
"We'll probably get a call and apology tomorrow which means nothing."
Steve Cooper has slammed VAR for "another bad weekend" ? pic.twitter.com/M8MhlCmti9
— Match of the Day (@BBCMOTD) April 16, 2023