Nottingham Forest’s relegation crunch match against Everton caused chaos and controversy as Forest seek action against another poor refereeing performance.
The tie was always going to be a heated affair considering the ramifications for both sides after the final whistle, but Forest were left seething after a string of ‘stone wall’ penalties failed to be awarded.
The performance of referee Anthony Taylor stole the headlines immediately after the game with his and VAR Stuart Atwell’s decisions coming under fire.
Forest had raised the issue of Stuart Atwell being a fan of Luton Town, another side embroiled in the Premier League relegation battle, to the PGMOL before kick-off and implied there to be some bias in the on-field decisions given against them that were backed up by Atwell after the game.
The following post was seen after the match on the official Nottingham Forest X account.
Three extremely poor decisions – three penalties not given – which we simply cannot accept.
We warned the PGMOL that the VAR is a Luton fan before the game but they didn’t change him. Our patience has been tested multiple times.
NFFC will now consider its options.
— Nottingham Forest (@NFFC) April 21, 2024
What these supposed ‘options’ are have yet to be seen but this statement has been released in the last hour detailing Nottingham Forest’s communication with the PGMOL.
Following yesterday’s match at Everton, NFFC issued a statement highlighting our concern at the perception of the PGMOL appointment of VAR for the game. This was an issue we raised with PGMOL prior to the fixture because of the fear of the side show that would ensue if anything…
— Nottingham Forest (@NFFC) April 22, 2024
The club have also appealed to have the voice recording between Anthony Taylor and Stuart Atwell be released.
Gary Neville and Jamie Carragher were both outspoken on Sky Sports Football, condemning the actions of Nottingham Forest with Neville stating: “Mark Clattenburg must resign tonight.
“If he sees those words go out which question the integrity and essentially call the VAR official a cheat because he supports a certain club, then he’s supporting what’s being said and he would lose all credibility with referees.”
Clattenburg was appointed by Nottingham Forest as their ‘referee analyst’ back in February.
In an interview with the Daily Mail, he said: “One of these errors would have been bad enough. Three was a joke, and that is why Nottingham Forest were left feeling victimised after another defeat in which zero big decisions went their way.”
Carragher compared the actions of the club on social media to that of ‘a fan in a pub,’ suggesting Forest look foolish in their attempt to find reason for the poor performance of officials in what was such an important game to their season.
Nottingham Forest remain outside the relegation zone on 26 points with four games left to go.
Everton have reached 30 points with the 2-0 victory leaving the Reds looking over their shoulders at not just Luton a point behind them on 25 but Burnley who have given their own survival chances a boost following a 4-1 victory over doomed Sheffield United on Saturday.
The outcome could have looked vastly different had Forest been awarded their first penalty appeal with the score at 1-0 to the Toffees and who know what events would have gone down had they equalised.
Nottingham Forest’s public outburst may not have been the correct way of seeking justice for poor officiating but it is clear that refereeing in England needs a major overhaul as these mistakes week in week out are putting a dampener on the ‘beautiful game’ and taking more headlines than moments produced by the players.
Maybe Nottingham Forest do have a valid point over the appointment of officials for fixtures with circumstances such as this as it was only two weeks ago that referee Bobby Madley had to be replaced by Sam Allison in a match between Birmingham City and Cardiff City due to Madley being a Huddersfield Town fan – a team fighting with Birmingham for survival in the SkyBet EFL Championship.