Bruce goes reffing mad at decisions
ALBION manager Steve Bruce was lost for words after the ‘‘ridiculous’’ first-half decisions that left his side facing an insurmountable deficit against Nottingham Forest.
Darnell Furlong was shown two yellow cards in the space of three minutes as Albion were reduced to ten men early on. There were no complaints about the first but the second was far from fair in the eyes of Bruce.
The wing-back was lying prone on the pitch, having slid in to stop Philip Zinckernagel getting a shot off, when another goalbound effort arrived on the rebound.
Furlong blocked the ball again but this time with an upright arm and referee David Webb pointed to the penalty spot and pulled out another yellow card that was soon followed by a red.
“Furs is on the ground and his head’s away looking at the goal,” bemoaned Bruce. “It hits his arm, yeah, okay, you give a penalty, do you have to give a yellow card and a sending-off? And all of a sudden, the game’s evaporated.”
Bruce also felt a throw-in decision should have gone Albion’s way in the build-up to the second goal.
He added: “The debacle over the throw-in was ridiculous, the
assistant flagged it was our throw. The ref’s overruled him. Then Forest score from the corner. They are two awful decisions.
“I said to the fourth official, they need to do their jobs. For both teams, they need to do their jobs and do it properly and if you’re going to overturn things, you have to be 100% right and when the linesman’s 10 yards away, why don’t you just go with the linesman?
“The bad thing for us is that the linesman’s stuck his flag up and we’ve all stopped so it’s given them a corner which they’ve scored from.”
Substitute Taylor GardnerHickman might have got into more trouble with the referee after lashing the ball into the crowd, for which he received a yellow card.
“He didn’t mean that,” said Bruce. “If the ball has hit someone in the crowd, then we’ll get in touch. He’s as genuine as they come. We will apologise if it’s hit someone.
“He wouldn’t do anything malicious. He’s tried to bash the ball against the advertising board and missed it.’’