FORMER Premier League referee Mark Halsey believes the officials made an error yesterday when they awarded Sunderland a penalty against Arsenal.
The reigning champions won the game 2-0 at the Stadium of Light, but were pushed all the way by the Black Cats.
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Former Newcastle midfielder Bruno Guimaraes opened the scoring in the 58th minute – just two minutes before the game’s most controversial moment when Sunderland were awarded a penalty.
The players in question were Ezri Konsa and Dan Ballard, with the former adjudged to have pulled the latter to the ground after Kevin Danso launched a long throw towards the near post – where the tugging took place.
But it appeared to be six of one half a dozen of the other, and former Prem ref Halsey weighed in on the incident.
Halsey exclusively told SunSport: “There was a controversial incident in the Sunderland vs Arsenal at the Stadium of Light… second half, 56th minute, Sunderland were awarded a penalty for a foul on Sunderland’s Ballard by Konsa.
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“Now, when you look at an incident, you can clearly see in my opinion, that Ballard committed the first offence.
“He’s got hold of Konsa’s arm, so he’s pulled him around and they’ve both ended up on the floor. Then it looks like Konsa has tumbled into Ballard.
“For me, I think that Ballard has committed the first offence and it’s not a penalty. Should VAR have got involved? Was it a clear and obvious error by the match referee?
“Now, I know that they’ve set a high bar now in VAR getting involved but I think that was one where they should have got involved because Ballard committed the first offence. So for me, it wasn’t a penalty and VAR should have got involved.”
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In the end, the penalty had no imapct on the result.
David Raya made a sensational diving save to tip Enzo Le Fee’s penalty on to the post before Arsenal immediately went up the other end and scored thanks to Guimaraes’ piledriver from 25 yards out.
Sunderland huffed and puffed chasing an equaliser, but Arsenal’s defence was resolute.
Then in the final minute of stoppage time, the Gunners were awarded a spot kick when Reinildo Mandava brought down Bukayo Saka in the box.
Referee Craig Pawson followed it up by sending off the Mozambican left-back – a decision Halsey again didn’t agree with.
He added: “Arsenal were awarded a penalty later on in the game, which was a clear penalty. But I felt that the second yellow card for Reinildo Mandava was not a second yellow card, it was a careless challenge and a penalty was a sufficient punishment.”