Mark Hughes frustrated with team and referee after Leicester draw
Saturday 19 September 2015 18:44, UK
Mark Hughes was frustrated with the officials and his team’s inability to “see games out” after Stoke City surrendered a 2-0 lead in a 2-2 draw with Leicester City on Saturday.
Stoke took a commanding advantage into the interval thanks to first-half goals from Bojan and Jon Walters, but Leicester rallied in the second half and rescued a point with goals from Riyad Mahrez and Jamie Vardy.
The result extended Stoke's winless start to the season and leaves them third-bottom of the Premier League on three points.
Hughes told Sky Sports: "We are frustrated. We put ourselves in a winning position with the level of performance we produced in the first half and we were good value.
"Unfortunately, we conceded in the first five minutes of the half a penalty. At 2-1, you are wary of a change of momentum and, credit to Leicester, they got their tails up and had a go in the second half.
"There are a lot of positives, but the negative is that we still need that first win. There were signs today that we are getting closer, but we need that 90-minute performance."
Hughes was angry at referee Andre Marriner for both Leicester goals. He felt the penalty that Mahrez converted was wrongly awarded and then thought Stoke should have had a free-kick in the moments leading up to the equaliser.
He added: "It looked like Marko Arnautovic had just clipped the lad's heel. It looked like it was outside, but even so, there was a likelihood that the penalty would have been given because the officials didn't get too much right today, to be perfectly honest.
"Maybe there was a situation in the opposition half when Jon Walters has been impeded two or three times. I have spoken to the referee and the referee has come out with he didn't give a free-kick at that point [because] he was playing an advantage, but it certainly wasn't our advantage because they kicked the ball 60 yards up the field, we miss a header and they score the equaliser.
"You want a level playing field. You hope the officials get the key moments and the key decisions in the game correct, and you hope that if they do get it wrong, it doesn't affect the result, which you could argue it did today with Andre Marriner and his associates."
