Brendan Rodgers slammed the actions of Tyler Morton for his ‘poor’ challenge on Ricardo Pereira, as Liverpool beat Leicester City on penalties in the EFL Cup on Wednesday night.
The Leicester boss told his post-match press conference that the on-field referee was ‘poor all night’, with Liverpool coming from 3-1 down to draw 3-3 and then win the tie on penalties.
In the first half, a late and high challenge by Morton left Pereira stricken on the floor and he was replaced by Marc Albrighton at right-back.
The on-field referee, Andy Madley, issued the 19-year-old with a yellow card, but with no VAR, he couldn’t have a second pair of eyes to look at the challenge.
Understandably so, Rodgers wasn’t best pleased by what he saw, as he shared the issues he had with the officiating during last night’s game.
“It was a poor challenge,” said Rodgers. “It was a poor challenge but I thought the referee was poor all night.
“You know me, I don’t normally comment on the referees. But there were bookings that should have gone in the first half.
“We had one moment where Madders is away, and if he’s away then he makes the pass and we are through into that dangerous position that we were in throughout the first half.
“It was Jordan (Henderson) that was clever and took the foul. And there’s no yellow card.
“Then, in the second half, he was giving out yellow cards for not a great deal. I thought the referee was poor all evening, to be honest.”
Given that Jurgen Klopp played a pretty young team from the get-go, it would have given a strong Leicester side extra belief that they can book their place in the semi-finals.
Jamie Vardy ran riot in the first half and put his team into a 2-0 lead inside 15 minutes, before Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain pulled one back.
That’s when James Maddison stepped up and scored a worldie of a goal, but then Liverpool began their fightback, including a stoppage-time equaliser to send the game to penalties.
Whilst Rodgers is annoyed by the calls made by the referee, he should probably be more frustrated that at 2-0 and 3-1 up, his team, against an inexperienced Liverpool side, just couldn’t get the job done.
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