London, July 18 (IANS) Manchester United manager Ole Gunnar Solskjaer didn’t mince his words as he hit back at Chelsea manager Frank Lampard over his claims that Virtual Assistant Referee (VAR) has been favouring the ‘Red Devils’ in the last few matches.
Lampard stopped short of being critical of the VAR decisions that have gone United’s way in recent matches. United have already been awarded 13 penalties this term, which is a joint Premier League record.
Ahead of his team’s FA Cup semi-final against Chelsea at the Wembley Stadium on Sunday, Solksjaer hit back at Lampard’s claims and pointed towards the occassions where VAR ruled against them.
“I can sit here for hours now and try to talk about this,” Solskjaer told reporters as per Goal.com. “It looks like there’s a narrative, it looks like people want to influence whoever’s making the decisions. I hear people talking about luck, that we’ve been lucky more than unlucky.
“If you look at the factual decisions, I don’t want to sound like a certain manager talking about facts, but if you’re offside, you’re offside. That’s clear. Talking about lucky, the penalty we got against Tottenham in the last minute that was taken away from us, that might be two points for us.
“Talking about the red card Romeu should have had against us when he almost got Mason Greenwood crippled, that should’ve been a red card, maybe that would’ve helped us.
“Talking about Mark Noble when he should have been sent off against us when we lost at West Ham, talking about the actual decision that is made that is against Man Utd but is overturned and corrected.
“So it’s actually me that should be complaining that we get decisions against us on the pitch by the on-pitch referee,” the Norwegian added.
Manchester United have already defeated Chelsea three times this season (twice in Premier League and once in Carabao Cup). Solksjaer will be hopeful of a fourth win over ‘The Blues’ in order to secure a place in the final of this prestigious competition.
–IANS
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