Moyes furious over ‘scandalous’ Webb decision

David Moyes labelled a controversial decision by referee Howard Webb as “scandalous” in the wake of his team’s 2-1 home defeat by Tottenham last night and questioned whether England’s most well-known man in the middle should be officiating such high-profile games.

The United manager also questioned the effectiveness of the PGMO, the body who appoint match officials, after Webb failed to award United a penalty following a late challenge by Spurs goalkeeper Hugo Lloris on Ashley Young.

“It was a scandal,” fumed Moyes. “It’s reckless, it’s late, it’s in the penalty box, I don’t know what else you can say.

“If you follow through on a player anywhere else on the pitch, foot-high, it’s a sending off and a penalty kick. Ashley Young gets the ball and he follows through. It’s an incredible decision that didn’t go our way. It’s one of the worst I’ve ever seen.

“You only hope the people who put the referees in there look to see if the referees are doing as well as they can. But they keep picking them don’t they? The people who employ referees are going to have to look at that.”

United have now dropped 26 points in the current campaign, one more than they squandered all of last season in winning the title in Alex Ferguson’s farewell term. More alarmingly, they now face the real prospect of becoming only the second defending Premier League champions in history to finish outside the top three thefollowing year.

Thus, Moyes’ outburst neatly deflects from another appalling result in a season that is deteriorating rapidly despite a run of six successive victories that was ended by Spurs.

Emmanuel Adebayor was one of a number of Tottenham heroes, scoring the opening goal and putting in a spirited display before being stretchered off injured after 70 minutes.

“He’s got ice on every part of his body at the moment, he doesn’t know what hurts more,” said new Tottenham manager Tim Sherwood.

“But he’s a top striker, one of the best in the league. When he performs like he is at the moment, he’s almost unstoppable.

“Let’s hope we can keep him going because he’s massively important to us. He seems happy in himself and wants to play every minute — apart from when he has to come off on astretcher!

“But they were all heroes today. We could have done better, and moved the ball a bit sharper, because I thought United were there for the taking but I thought we showed the heart of a lion out there.”