Bruce sees red at friend
Heading away from White Hart Lane on Saturday night, Sunderland boss Steve Bruce was still at a loss to explain why referee Kevin Friend had not reduced Spurs to 10 men when keeper Heurelho Gomes grounded Darren Bent in the penalty area in the second half.
The official got one half of the incident right when he pointed to the spot.
But Bruce felt that, by the same token, Gomes had to be sent off.
And, he thought, if the referee had got it right, Sunderland would have been dealing with Spurs' second-choice keeper, ex-Sunderland goalie Ben Alnwick, for the last half hour and with a real chance against a team reduced to 10 men.
"The big turning point of the game for me was not so much that Darren Bent's penalty was saved as the fact that the Spurs keeper has denied Bent a clear goal-scoring opportunity and should have gone," said Bruce.
"That's the bottom line for me.
"It's got nothing to do with whether Darren is going away from goal or not.
"Now if Gomes had been a defender, he would have been off.
"The referee told me Bent was going away from goal, but, in my opinion, that's a load of nonsense.
"If you look at it, the ball didn't even go out of play, so Bent is likely to get on it.
"Yes, Woodgate might have got back for it, but I would still fancy Benty to score, especially when he goes around the goalkeeper in that
situation.
"Now if we had got that important decision, it might have been different.
"The reserve goalkeeper might have come on and he might have saved it.
"But it's still 10 men there against 11 with half an hour to go and suddenly we've got the advantage."
That was just one of a series of decisions that Bruce felt didn't go his side's way in the game – Robbie Keane's opening goal, for example, could easily have been flagged offside, though replays showed it was fractionally on.
"I can understand the Robbie Keane goal being given," said Bruce.
"It was close in terms of offside and you either get it our you don't.
"They got it, we didn't.
"But I thought Bent deserved a first-half stone-cold penalty where the goalkeeper clears him out and we didn't get it – and that sort of summed it up for me because it was one of those days where you simply don't get anything."
The Black Cats boss was asked if he thought that Bent might perhaps have gone down too easily for the penalty he did get, but Bruce railed against that suggestion.
"It's a stone-cold penalty," he said dismissively.
"If someone's rushing out at you, the one thing you're going to try and do is get out of the road.
"There's a difference between getting out of the road and diving, but I think everyone in the ground knew he was going to get to the ball first.
"For me, he's denied the man in possession a clear goalscoring opportunity.
"I don't like that particular rule, I think it's a load of rubbish, but, by the letter of the law, Gomes should have gone.
"It is a grey area and we argue about these things every week, but Gomes has denied Bent a goalscoring opportunity and it should be a red card.
"It's a debatable incident, as these things are, constantly.
"But if that had been the Stadium of Light, I might have got a different decision."
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Wednesday 08 February 2012
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