Sunderland were denied a penalty against Manchester United as the referee’s decision was overturned at Old Trafford after Benjamin Sesko was initially judged to have committed a foul in the Premier League clash
Sunderland were denied a penalty in controversial circumstances against Manchester United. Benjamin Sesko’s high foot came close to the head of Trai Hume but did not appear to connect, which saw the initial penalty decision overturned.
There was confusion as Stuart Attwell pointed to the spot amid appeals from the visitors at Old Trafford. It was not long until the official was sent to rewatch the play.
It transpired that the ball connected with Hume’s face while Sesko did not make contact in the incident, other than perhaps grazing his opponent’s shoulder.
The Premier League Match Centre confirmed the process. “After VAR review, the referee overturned the original decision of penalty to Sunderland.
Referee announcement: “After review, there is no foul by the Manchester United player. He does not make contact with the head of the attacker. As the ball is out of play when the decision was made, the final decision is corner kick.”
Former referee Mike Dean questioned whether Attwell needed to be sent to the screen at all. The Sky Sports pundit believes it should not have taken that much time, given the decision that was required.
Dean said on Soccer Saturday: “The issue I have, we have referees as VARs and assistant referees as assistant VARs.
“For some reason today, we’ve got an assistant referee as VAR and an assistant VAR. So they don’t really know what’s happened.
“For me, there’s no contact whatsoever. He shouldn’t have been sent to the screen, it should have been cleared on the field.”
The decision threatened to put a dampener on what had been an exciting opening 45 minutes for Ruben Amorim’s side. Mason Mount opened the scoring after just eight minutes as United started on the front foot against their in-form opposition.
Sesko then doubled his side’s advantage just after the half hour mark as the Red Devils looked to get back to winning ways following defeat to Brentford seven days ago.
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