After Jose Mourinho asserted that his side were undone by several refereeing decisions in their 1-1 draw against Burnely on Saturday at Stamford Bridge, Everton manager Roberto Martinez has lashed out claiming that Chelsea players try to influence referees.
Everton had been narrowly beaten by Chelsea at Stamford Bridge couple of weeks ago after Gareth Barry’s red card right at the business end of the game. Martinez who was not amused by the performance of referee Jon Moss accused Mourinho’s players of trying to manipulate the match official.
Martinez in particularly refereed towards Moss’ indecision on not to send off Branislav Ivanovic after the defender had grabbed James McCarthy by the throat during an altercation. It fuelled that Spanish manager’s belief that Chelsea get the decisions in their favour.
Martinez in his pre match programme notes ahead of Everton’s 2-2 draw with Leicester City on Sunday claimed, “Unfortunately, the sending off really late on reflected the emphasis that the home team had in trying to influence the referee and take advantage of their role of playing at Stamford Bridge.
“Mo Besic being booked after five minutes was a very loose way to referee a game and there was no need to show as many yellow cards as there were. But, more importantly, I never felt there was any consistency in judging every action equally between the two teams.
“That made it a tougher way to digest a defeat that we didn’t deserve and showed a very similar ending to last season’s game at Stamford Bridge. Big games need strong referees but, for the future, we relish the challenge of finding the way of overcoming these disadvantages by playing our football in a typical Everton manner.”
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