Mancini bemoans refereeing decisions

Posted Tuesday, December 13, 2011 by ESPN

Roberto Mancini hit out at referee Mark Clattenburg after watching Chelsea end his Manchester City side's unbeaten start to the Barclays Premier League season.

City boss Mancini was fuming with Clattenburg's decision to wave away his side's penalty appeal while they were leading 1-0 and completely dominating at a wet and windy Stamford Bridge.

Clattenburg rubbed salt into the wound by sending off Gael Clichy as well as awarding Chelsea a late spot-kick as Mancini's men lost 2-1 and gave hope to all of their title rivals.

Asked about Clattenburg's performance, Mancini said sarcastically: "I agree with all of his decisions."

The official appeared to have a good view of City's first-half penalty claim, when David Silva went over after Jose Bosingwa dangled his leg in the box.

Asked why Clattenburg might not have seen the incident, Mancini said: "It was raining a lot."

He added: "We did a good performance in the first half. We played very, very well, deserved to score two or three goals.

"There was a big penalty. There wasn't a fan outside the stadium who didn't see it.

"But the referee was very close and didn't see it.

"When one team plays very well and has a chance to score another goal there is a big penalty, you should concede.

"When you play against Chelsea, you can lose, because Chelsea's a good team - but not like this."

Opposite number Andre Villas-Boas admitted his side had been fortunate, saying of Mancini: "It's unlucky for him.

"We've been having our decisions that have not been going our way and today it maybe didn't go Man City's way.

"But that's the nature of the game and at least our penalty's a blatant penalty."

Mancini said he had not spoken to Clattenburg, who booked Clichy twice in 11 minutes to hand Chelsea the initiative.

"After the sending-off, the game totally changed," said Mancini, who admitted there had been a heated exchange in the tunnel between opposing players after the game.

"I don't know if (Ashley) Cole said something.

"I don't know what he said. I don't understand."

Asked where the team goes from here, Mancini told Sky Sports 1: "We can do nothing. We are at the top. We know it was possible to lose one game. But we hope after tonight we will draw or win [the rest of the games]."

He pointed to the fact that City have already came a long way to become the team to beat in the Premier League.

"The Chelsea players after the game were really happy to beat us. That shows we are a top team at this moment and that all the teams want to beat us, and this is important for us.

"We worked well up to now and now we should continue.

"I hope that we can go another 14 games without losing."

Mancini continued: "It doesn't change anything for us, because we knew before we should lose one game,

"We lost today but the season is very, very long, it's very hard.

"We didn't deserve to lose this game but we lost.

"Now it's finished and after tomorrow [Tuesday], we should prepare for the next game, which will be difficult because we meet Arsenal."