Mark Yates hits out at the referee as Macclesfield’s wait for a win goes on

Posted Sunday, September 30, 2018 by PA

After collecting a point from Macclesfield’s 1-1 draw at home to Forest Green, neither manager was satisfied with referee Graham Salisbury.

Winless Macclesfield drew level through Scott Wilson after falling behind to Dayle Grubb’s free kick two minutes into the second half.

But controversy reigned late on when Wilson appeared to have been fouled by Rovers keeper Robert Sanchez and the official awarded a penalty, withdrawing it after consulting his assistant.

“The referee is in a perfect position, he had exactly the same view as us except he’s 40 yards closer,” explained Mark Yates, still to win a game as Macclesfield manager.

“Whether it was or not I’m not 100-per-cent sure but he’s given it and the linesman was 60 yards away, the fourth official the same distance. The referee is in a miles better position but he’s gone over to the far side, which baffles me, asked the linesman and come back over and booked Scotty.

“I’m going to ask him about that decision because he certainly didn’t get there on the advice from speaking to the linesman on the far side. It sums our luck up at the moment.

“It’s probably our most complete performance of the season, without being sparkling. All I had asked for was effort, commitment, desire and work rate and we played some good football within that as well, we can count ourselves a bit unlucky not to win the game.”

Forest Green boss Mark Cooper was also unimpressed with the match official, though he feels he made the right call at the second time of asking.

“It was a blatant dive, you could see from where we were, the referee guessed at a lot of things today, for both teams,” he said after the point continued their unbeaten start to the season. “It’s contentious whether their goal was offside or not but they probably deserved to get that bit of fortune.

“I’m not happy with our performance, I said it was going to be a difficult game, we’re very lucky to get a point. We had no zest or drive about us then Grubby came on and scored and we conceded a goal. It looks borderline offside but we still need to defend it better.

“We didn’t play well, I said to the players before the game I didn’t want any excuses. I think we used plenty for that performance though, and we’re lucky to get out of here with a point. We’ll take that and move on.”