Manchester Utd v Aston Villa Post-Match Thread

[Crown Hill]

Had a lingering doubt we'd do what was required up there. Those feckers always seem to come out on top, usually through some controversial moment.

Off the top of my head....

• Vidic should have seen red in the League Cup final in 2010
• The Fernandes penalty where he trod on Konsa's foot in the penalty area
• The Rogers goal yesterday

There are almost certainly more which I have erased from living memory. In hindsight, I'm glad they lost that Europa final the other night. Tossers.

92 and those 7 minutes of injury time which was unheard of then. Not against us but we were in a battle for the league with them.

Forgotten all the detail now but I used to be able to make the case - and did as a student in Manchester - that they didn’t deserve to win any of their final ten matches in 92-93!

[Rigadon]

A summer dreaming of signing Jonathan David now turns into hoping we can get Kevin Philips over the line.

It's a summer for being smart in the transfer market for sure.  I'm not sure I was ever dreaming of Jonathan David though, and I'd say he's more like a target now for us than he might've been before.   

[darren woolley]

I'm absolutely gutted I really thought we would do it.

[Monty]

This was the worst it could've possibly gone, an absolutely hellish day, just a horrible, hideous thing. The fact that Newcastle bottled it that badly too is almost too much to take.

Just to say, had Torres played that terrible backpass that eventually got Martinez sent off this place would be a smouldering ruin! I like Cash but man, he sure knows how to make a mistake.

[RamboandBruno]

It was a horrible performance. I like Cash too, but it felt like the kind of mistake that could kill your career at the club. Not one of the starters comes out with any credit yesterday, but that mistake from Cash was both awful and had huge implications, from a player that probably isn’t one those that are secure. And you’re right Monty, Torres is never forgiven for that.

[PaulWinch again]

This was the worst it could've possibly gone, an absolutely hellish day, just a horrible, hideous thing. The fact that Newcastle bottled it that badly too is almost too much to take.

Just to say, had Torres played that terrible backpass that eventually got Martinez sent off this place would be a smouldering ruin! I like Cash but man, he sure knows how to make a mistake.

No it isn’t, if Forest had equalised we’d be in 7th.

[Crown Hill]

And Wood had a big chance at the end.

One thought occurs to me. It’s not beyond the realms that Cov supporting Attwell would have upheld the ref’s decision even if he hadn’t blown his whistle!

[Meanwood Villa]

I think it's far from guaranteed VAR would have overturned it. We know their remit is to back up their mate.

[The Edge]

This was the worst it could've possibly gone, an absolutely hellish day, just a horrible, hideous thing. The fact that Newcastle bottled it that badly too is almost too much to take.

Just to say, had Torres played that terrible backpass that eventually got Martinez sent off this place would be a smouldering ruin! I like Cash but man, he sure knows how to make a mistake.

No it isn’t, if Forest had equalised we’d be in 7th.

Yeah every cloud and all that. Having watched the highlights of their game i don't know how they didn't get an equaliser. Conference league would of been a shattering blow after doing so well in this seasons CL.

[PaulWinch again]

It would have been.

[Somniloquism]

So, are you genuinely arguing that there would be a problem if VAR reviewed the decision?

Not what is the letter of the law, but with play stopped (with the ball in the back of the net), sending the ref to the monitor to get the decision right has to be the only sensible outcome.

Otherwise, there is no point in VAR.

I'm stating simple concepts.

1: VAR is only involved for decisions on goals, penalties and red cards that happen when play is live on the pitch.

2: Play stops as soon as the ref blows his whistle. VAR can continue to look at live incidents that involve any of the three things that happened before the ref blows but not actions that happen after the ref blows. So if the ref had called the foul and the keeper then brought down Rogers for a penalty, the penalty wouldn't have been looked at as it happened after the whistle had blown, even though it wasn't a foul.

In our case, Ref blew his whistle a second before the ball crossed the line, so play stopped at that point without a goal being scored. VAR could check to see if the ball crossed the line before the whistle, and if it had, then all you mention above could then happen. As it didn't, they couldn't do anything else under the rules of the game as a simple foul is not checked by VAR. The mistake is definitely the refs as he took the decision off VAR and nothing could be done. Hence our letter of complaint is about the ref and not VAR.

[Somniloquism]

And Wood had a big chance at the end.

One thought occurs to me. It’s not beyond the realms that Cov supporting Attwell would have upheld the ref’s decision even if he hadn’t blown his whistle!

I think I mentioned in passing that it wasn't guaranteed that Atwell would have given the goal even if he had the chance. Although I would like to think that when even Gallagher and Dean was stating it should have been a goal that even Atwell, probably already on caution for missing the blatant handball the week before, would have given the foul on the keeper.

[BoVillan esq]

This was the worst it could've possibly gone, an absolutely hellish day, just a horrible, hideous thing. The fact that Newcastle bottled it that badly too is almost too much to take.

Just to say, had Torres played that terrible backpass that eventually got Martinez sent off this place would be a smouldering ruin! I like Cash but man, he sure knows how to make a mistake.

I agree Cash's back pass was poor, personally I think he was looking for Konsa or Torres and was in 2 minds with Martinez being there, but if you look at the incident from pretty much all angles what Martinez did was nothing short of astonishing, Torres was already on his way back to cover, the ball was going away from from goal and above all that he must have known that Højlund and actually lost control of the ball, he would never have scored in a million years, I have no doubt Cash was initially at fault but once the error occurred after that, Martinez was amazing.

[The Edge]

And Wood had a big chance at the end.

One thought occurs to me. It’s not beyond the realms that Cov supporting Attwell would have upheld the ref’s decision even if he hadn’t blown his whistle!

I think I mentioned in passing that it wasn't guaranteed that Atwell would have given the goal even if he had the chance. Although I would like to think that when even Gallagher and Dean was stating it should have been a goal that even Atwell, probably already on caution for missing the blatant handball the week before, would have given the foul on the keeper.

That would of been very interesting as there was definitely no foul on the keeper.

[BoVillan esq]

So, are you genuinely arguing that there would be a problem if VAR reviewed the decision?

Not what is the letter of the law, but with play stopped (with the ball in the back of the net), sending the ref to the monitor to get the decision right has to be the only sensible outcome.

Otherwise, there is no point in VAR.

I'm stating simple concepts.

1: VAR is only involved for decisions on goals, penalties and red cards that happen when play is live on the pitch.

2: Play stops as soon as the ref blows his whistle. VAR can continue to look at live incidents that involve any of the three things that happened before the ref blows but not actions that happen after the ref blows. So if the ref had called the foul and the keeper then brought down Rogers for a penalty, the penalty wouldn't have been looked at as it happened after the whistle had blown, even though it wasn't a foul.

In our case, Ref blew his whistle a second before the ball crossed the line, so play stopped at that point without a goal being scored. VAR could check to see if the ball crossed the line before the whistle, and if it had, then all you mention above could then happen. As it didn't, they couldn't do anything else under the rules of the game as a simple foul is not checked by VAR. The mistake is definitely the refs as he took the decision off VAR and nothing could be done. Hence our letter of complaint is about the ref and not VAR.

You can see where VAR is concerned and VAR kicks in its so vague, I mean, how do we actually know the ref blew his whistle and when, how do we know he had blown his whistle before the ball had crossed the line, how do we know that for a fact.