Coyle unhappy with referee Foy

Clarets boss criticial of decisions

By James Riach   Last updated: 28th November 2009   Subscribe to RSS Feed

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Burnley manager Owen Coyle was disappointed with referee Chris Foy in the aftermath of the defeat to West Ham.

The Clarets went down 5-3 at Upton Park and Coyle criticised the official for not getting important decisions correct throughout the game.

West Ham twice scored from the penalty spot and were cruising at 5-0 before a spirited Burnley fought back to score three times in the last 25 minutes.

Coyle was unhappy at Foy although he did concede that his side had played poorly and conceded sloppy goals.

"I'm loathe to start speaking about the officials but what I would say was anyone who watched the game, please you be the judge of it - of what you think went on," he told Sky Sports.

"I was certainly disappointed by one or two things. I know it's a difficult task so we'll leave it at that.

"But again we made some poor decisions ourselves, defensively, my players. They know - I've spoken to them at length.

"We can't, at this level, continue to give away goals. We know we're effective when we go forward, we know we can pass and move the ball as well as anybody, I believe.

"But we have to obviously brush up on that and we didn't do it today. Again, some decisions went against us, sorry, big moments in the game.

"I certainly felt that Franco had handballed (for the second goal) when the ball was thrown in and controlled it with his arm. I thought that was a free-kick, it wasn't given, and Brian made the save and maybe we could have reacted to it better.

Decision

"The fourth goal I thought was our free-kick and it was given against us. But having said that we still have to defend it when it comes in.

"I just felt we came out on the wrong side of some of decisions today, hopefully on another day we'll get a little bit of favour for us, although it's not happened too often."

Burnley started the game extremely well and were on top before West Ham took the lead through Jack Collison.

Coyle thought that his team did not deserve to be behind by five goals, feeling the Clarets controlled large periods of the match

"It probably sounds bizarre to say it, but I think if somebody was to watch the entirety of that match you'll know that was never a 5-3 scoreline against us," he added.

"For huge periods of that game we've controlled the game, passed the ball really well, scored three goals, if truth be told we could have had seven or eight on the day.

"Having said that I'm annoyed obviously at the goals we conceded, one or two contentious decisions.

Poor

"Any goal changes the course of a game, there's no doubt about that. I mean their first goal was a quickly-taken free-kick with Scott Parker who, to be fair to West Ham, I thought was an outstanding player on the day, I mean a really gifted player. And we made a poor decision.

"It is an unhappy away day because we came here to get all three points and as strange as it sounds, being 5-0 down in the game, you see yourselves we controlled the first half prior to West Ham scoring the goal and then they got their tails up.

"We offered an awful lot to the game. We showed unbelievable courage and bravery at 5-0 down because it's easy to feel sorry for yourself.

"But we didn't, we scored three goals and in that period we could have had a few more to add to that.

"The courage and bravery that my lads show, they do it on a game-to-game basis and we know we're on a learning curve and trying to evolve and get better at this level, and there's things we can brush up on."

Burnley captain Steven Caldwell was sent off in the last minute for a foul on Zavon Hines, and Coyle was also annoyed at that decision.

He said: "The lad (Hines), from my take on it, certainly careered into the back of him and it's a double blow - one to concede the free-kick and obviously to have my captain suspended."

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