London, April 12 - A war of words broke out between two managers after a goal was controversially disallowed in this fiercely contested match which saw Manchester United emerge winners, 3-1, against Tottenham Hotspur. United were denied a 34th minute goal by Edinson Cavani after the referee consulted VAR which showed that United’s Scott McTominay had fouled, pushing his hand into the face on Son Heung-Min.
United manager, Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, felt that Son had overreacted. “The game has absolutely gone, it was a perfectly good goal. We shouldn’t be conned, I have to say, if my son stays down for three minutes and he needs his 10 mates to help him up, he won’t get any food. We weren’t conned, the referee was conned.”
He said the injustice inspired United’s comeback. “From that moment we played some very good football and obviously conceded a goal after that. But the players came together and were not going to let a decision like that derail their season. That showed strength and character in the team. We come together in difficult moments and we’ve done that many times this season.”
Tottenham took the lead in the 40th minute and it came from none other than Son. Harry Kane received the ball from Serge Aurier and found Lucas Moura. The midfielder promptly passed to the South Korean who showed no ill-effects in tapping the ball into the net.
United came into the second half with vigour and soon equalised. Goalkeeper Hugo Lloris managed to push out a shot from Cavani in the 57th minute but the ball went to Fred who reacted quickly to slot the ball in to draw level.
They then took the lead with a brilliant goal from Cavani in the 79th minute. Bruno Fernandes teed up Mason Greenwood on the right whose cross resulted in Cavani’s wonderful diving header. United went further ahead in the last minute of added time. Paul Pogba passed to Greenwood on the far side to see him drive powerfully inside the near post.
Spurs unhappy manager, Jose Mourinho said: “I am very disappointed, I have told Ole already what I think about his comments on Sonny. If it is me telling Player A, B or C from another club that ‘if he was my son, I wouldn’t be giving him dinner tonight’ or something like that, what would be the reaction? It’s really sad nobody asks me about it. It’s sad nobody has the moral honesty to treat me the way you treat others.”
He added: “In relation to that I just want to say Sonny is very lucky that his father is a better person than Ole. Because I think a father – and I am a father – you have to feed your kids no matter what they do. I have to tell you I’m very disappointed that in seven questions you (journalists) ignore these comments.”
Both managers exchanged jibes before the match but the post-match comments took their feud to another level.
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