‘I didn’t think’ - Gary Neville and Jamie Carragher disagree over Wolves penalty claim in Man Utd defeat

Gary Neville and Jamie Carragher have disagreed over a decision to deny Wolverhampton Wanderers a late penalty in their narrow defeat at Manchester United on Monday night.

The Red Devils put in a laboured display as they were put through a severe test by a Wolves side working under new manager Gary O’Neil for the first time since his appointment was confirmed last week. The visitors created a whole host of chances to snatch at least a point as the likes of Fabio Silva, Matheus Cunha and Hee-Chan Hwang all went close.

However, it was Erik ten Hag’s men that took the honours as defender Raphael Varane headed home the only goal of the game with just under quarter of an hour remaining. But United suffered a late scare when debutant goalkeeper Andre Onana clumsily collided with Wolves substitute Sasa Kalajdzic as the game ventured deep into injury-time.

Referee Simon Hooper waved away vociferous protests from the visitors and his decision was backed up by VAR official Michael Salisbury, who decided against sending the on-field official to the pitchside monitor.

Former United captain Neville believes his old side got lucky with the decision and insisted the former Inter Milan goalkeeper made a ‘calculated’ decision to try and disrupt the Wolves striker.

The Red Devils legend told Sky Sports: “The reason I thought it was a penalty was because I don’t think Onana was anywhere near the ball. I think he was always under it, he was never getting there, so I think he could have made a decision before he jumped. I always used to say if my keeper was coming out, take everything, take the lot, and he’s done that.

“He’s done that, but the problem is he is nowhere near the ball, he’s in a calculated fashion decided he’s going to disturb the attacking player as much as he can and put him off - so I think it’s a penalty because he wasn’t near enough the ball. If he’s arrived at the same time, and he had just missed the ball, that’s a different story.

“I think he knew what he was doing.”

Although there was almost widespread disagreement with the decision, there was a surprising show of support for the officials from Liverpool legend Carragher.

He said: “I wasn’t sure. I think when I initially saw it and it hadn’t been given as a penalty, I didn’t think there was anyway it was going to be overturned. I didn’t think it was that big of a mistake.

“You talk about the high bar, you talk about wanting to keep the referee’s decision on the pitch, I think once the referee hadn’t given it, I didn’t think it was that big of a mistake for them to overturn it. So I didn’t expect the referee to go and look at the screen.”