Wolves boss Gary O'Neil left fuming at 'terrible' penalty decision

Jean-Ricner Bellegarde’s first goal for Wolves seemed to have rescued a point until referee Rob Jones pointed to the spot in the 97th minute, claiming Fabio Silva had caught George Baldock.

In a decision similar to the controversial one given against Wolves the weekend before, VAR took a long time deliberating before giving the spot-kick, giving Sheffield United a late winner.

“It’s not a penalty, there is hardly any contact,” O’Neil said.

“It’s a tough one to discuss really, I think. It’s another terrible decision.

“I don’t understand why he feels the need to give it. Pause, take your time. It’s not about you.

“If you’ve made a clear and obvious error there, VAR will tell you after.

“I’ve been in with him. He still thinks it’s a penalty. Still.

“He says there’s contact. The only contact I can see is maybe Fabio’s shin pad with Baldock’s calf, like a sort of a graze.

“Baldock’s already on his way down. I’m sat there watching it with him (the referee) and he still tells me it’s a penalty, which tells me that we’re in a pretty bad spot because that’s never, ever a penalty.

“If you give a foul for that much contact, there’d have been a million fouls in the 90 minutes.

“Then because of the wording that we use, VAR can’t intervene because it is not deemed clear and obvious because Fabio’s shin pad touches Baldock’s calf. Craziness.”

Despite an independent panel agreeing the decision last week was the wrong one, Wolves did not receive an apology and O’Neil is adamant he will not seek one this week.

He added: “I don’t expect anything. We didn’t get an apology last week and apologies don’t help me.

“We’re six points down, maybe, from refereeing decisions.

“If you just take some of these answers, it’s going to look like I’m blaming referees for where we are and I’m not.

“I’ve said a million times now we need to be better so that they don’t affect us as much but the facts are, they’ve had a big impact on our points total and an impact on where we are in league, and on the feel of the place.

“It has an impact on how well I’m deemed to have done as a new manager arriving at Wolves.

Twelve points is a big difference to 18 so the impact that these decisions are having is big.

“But I don’t expect anything from them, I think to sit and have a conversation, with it in front of me and in front of the referee and him still think that that’s a penalty just tells me that it’s absolutely crazy.

“It’s absolutely crazy that anybody would think that was a penalty. It’s never, ever a penalty, so I’m worried about it at the moment.

“I think they’re in a bad spot and they seem to be going against us all the time, but I’m sure others have got their own gripes at other clubs.”

Fabio Silva was left in tears after the game, in what was his first minutes for almost a month.

But O’Neil says the club will rally around the young striker.

He said: “He was obviously very upset. I think everyone could see how upset he was at the end.

“And he has my full support. Obviously, no one makes mistakes or goes on to do things that don’t go well on purpose. So he has my full support. But that defeat today is on me and the whole group, not on Fabio. We need to be better. We take that together.”