Referee gave the most laughable foul against Sabitzer to stop Man Utd’s counter v Palace

The state of Premier League officiating has been called into question a lot this season.

And there was another clear example of a referee making a strange decision at Old Trafford on Saturday.

During Manchester United’s 2-1 victory against Crystal Palace, Erik ten Hag’s men were under the cosh following a controversial second-half red card given to Casemiro.

Austrian midfielder Marcel Sabitzer, a deadline day loan signing from Bayern Munich, made an impressive late cameo, but unsurprisingly, he couldn’t believe one particular decision.

Ref’s woeful decision vs Sabitzer

In the 90th minute, he won the ball back with a very clean tackle and he looked to release an in-form Marcus Rashford on the break to wrap up the three points.

Referee Andre Marriner blew his whistle, however, and called the play back for a foul to give the visitors an opportunity to put a dangerous ball into the box.

Video: Sabitzer ‘foul’ given by the referee

The "foul" by Sabitzer given which prevented Man Utd going through on goal in 89′ at 2-1. from soccer

It’s unclear whether Rashford would have been able to get into a goalscoring opportunity due to the fact he was still in his own half with one defender covering, but with the form he’s in lately, it wouldn’t have been a surprise to anyone.

Reddit users couldn’t believe the decision, although errors like that seem to be becoming more commonplace in English football.

One user wrote: “Classic PL referee, just completely out of nowhere decision.”

Another said: “Absolutely f****** ridiculous. It didn’t even look close to a foul in real time. I know everyone says this all the time, but this ref just seemed determined to penalise United.”

“Only reason I can think of is that ref didn’t want to sprint all the way back,” “You always know it’s bad when the opponent doesn’t even think it’s a foul,” “What a state of a ref” and “Typical refereeing now” were a handful of other replies to the baffling decision.

And another user was unhappy about more than one decision that occurred yesterday.

They wrote: “Disgraceful decision by the referee. Also, Casemiro rightly sent off, but Ayew literally slapped Fred in the mouth and it wasn’t even shown to the referee on the VAR replay.”

Casemiro red card

Earlier in the game, a scuffle broke out between both sets of players with United leading 2-0, thanks to goals by Bruno Fernandes and Rashford.

Casemiro was sent off following a VAR review after appearing to hold Palace midfielder Will Hughes around the neck.

United boss Erik ten Hag was unhappy with the final decision, as he said: “First of all, we have to deal with it and we will do, but it is not right.

“It shouldn’t have happened. And last week, VAR doesn’t do anything about the tackle (on Christian Eriksen by Andy Carroll), but this was avoidable and because in this incident there have to be consequences and they are inconsistent and that is not right, that is not fair against us.”