West Brom boss Slaven Bilic was equally bemused at Old Trafford after his side were awarded a penalty for a foul by Bruno Fernandes on Conor Gallagher, only for referee David Coote to reverse the decision after consulting the pitchside monitor.
“I saw it a few times and for me it’s a penalty,” he said. “There is no reason for Conor Gallagher to go down without being fouled. He touched his shin.”
To make things worse for the Baggies, United were awarded a spot-kick themselves just minutes later for handball by Darnell Furlong.
Bilic accepts it was the correct decision to award the penalty under the new handball rules, but says there was a foul by Red Devils midfielder Fred on Gallagher in the build-up, which should have been spotted by the video assistant referee.
“If it’s for us, I ask for a penalty, but [Darnell Furlong] was unlucky. The new rules – no problem,” he added. “But I have a problem with the foul before. They checked the foul before so I was quite confident but then it was no foul.”
Manchester United boss Ole Gunnar Solskjaer admitted West Brom should probably have had a penalty, though he pointed to the similar incident in the Aston Villa game as evidence the officials are at least consistent with their decisions.
“I looked at a penalty this afternoon, in the Villa-Brighton game, and there’s contact on the ball and then the man,” he told BT Sport.
“In my head, it might be a penalty. Maybe here we’re a tad lucky but none of them are given. Maybe the rules are different to how I interpret them.”
Shearer agreed, saying: “He’s trying his best to get out of the way. Under the laws it’s a penalty.”