Mark Clattenburg says he did not agree with what referee did during Man Utd’s game vs Sunderland

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Manchester United enjoyed a straightforward victory against Sunderland, although it was almost made a little more complicated.

The 2-0 home victory over Sunderland was a rarity for Manchester United, a game in which Ruben Amorim’s side controlled from start to finish.

There was one scare just before half-time, when a penalty was awarded to Sunderland after Benjamin Sesko was judged to have made contact with an opponent inside the box.

After going to VAR, the decision was made to award a corner to Sunderland instead, and United went in 2-0 up at the break instead of most probably, 2-1.

Mark Clattenburg criticises referee

Speaking to Beyond The Back Four, former Premier League referee Mark Clattenburg hit out at the original decision to award a penalty to Sunderland.

However, Clattenburg did praise the process that eventually saw the correct decision made in the end.

“Sesko raises his foot but there’s no contact. There’s absolutely no contact by Sesko on the Sunderland defender.

“In fact, the ball hits the attacker’s head which is the Sunderland player’s head and that’s where maybe they thought that there was a contact because the player goes down holding his face.

“But what the VAR does is very, very clever. He then sees the images. He clearly see there’s no contact. The ball has hit the player’s face, not the foot. So recommends a review.

“And that’s when Stuart Attwell goes to the on field monitor, changes his decision from a penalty kick to back to a corner based on the images that was given by the VAR. So the process was correct. 

I didn’t agree with what Stuart Attwell did originally from the corner to the penalty from advice from an assistant who wasn’t well-positioned.”

Manchester United received apology from previous incident

Manchester United fans were relieved to see the penalty decision go the right way, making for a more comfortable second half.

It emerged over the weekend that the Premier League had issued an apology to Manchester United over an incident in the previous week’s defeat to Brentford.

Nathan Collins was only given a yellow card after a last man foul on Bryan Mbeumo instead of a straight red, and Brentford were able to play the final 15 minutes plus stoppage time with 10 men instead of 11.

The apology came too late for United, but at least the Premier League do not have to issue a second apology for a second straight week, after getting the penalty call against Sesko correct in the end.