Ole Gunnar Solskjaer has hit back at the referee for not awarding Manchester United a penalty when they were leading 1-0 as Cristiano Ronaldo went down in the box
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In pictures: Young Boys v Manchester United
Ole Gunnar Solskjaer has accused referee Francois Letexier of bottling a decision to award Manchester United a penalty during their defeat to Young Boys.
The Red Devils opened their Champions League campaign with a defeat as the Swiss side completed a dramatic comeback.
Cristiano Ronaldo opened the scoring, but Aaron Wan-Bissaka’s dismissal turned the game on its head as Moumi Ngamaleu equalised for the hosts, before Jordan Siebatche sealed all three points in stoppage time after an error from Jesse Lingard.
But the Man Utd boss has hit back at the ref for not awarding United a penalty when they were leading 1-0 in the first half.
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Solskjaer claimed Ronaldo should have had a penalty – when he was bundled to the ground – and accused the 32-year-old ref Letexier of bottling the decision as he would have needed to send off the Young Boys defender.
He said: “He should have had a penalty and it should have been a sending off the other way.
“But he probably didn’t give it as he’d have had to send him off and that’s sometimes what you get with young refs.”
United fans were raging that the Norwegian took off Ronaldo in the second half as the Red Devils would go on to lose the game in injury time.
But Solskjaer has passed the buck onto Letexier as if United had been awarded a spot-kick, with a chance to make it 2-0, they would have likely gone on to win the game and Ronaldo’s substitution would have been irrelevant.
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The Old Trafford manager revealed he always planned to take him and Bruno Fernandes off due to their efforts at the weekend against Newcastle United.
He added: “The game had gone 70-odd minutes, they [Ronaldo and Bruno Fernandes] had been running a lot both Saturday and today.
“The artificial grass takes its toll as well, and we wanted Nemanja [Matic’s] experience to keep hold of the ball and Jesse’s legs.”
