After succumbing to Warri Wolves in a Week 4 tie at home, Jos University Teaching Hospital (Juth) Football Club, have fingered the centre referee, Charles Ozigbo from Anambra State, for plotting their loss.
Captain of The Healers, Shola Olaniyi, said he and his teammates were denied the chance of coming back into the game claiming that Ozigbo turned down three penalty appeals against Warri Wolves.
Olaniyi also described the game at their home ground, the Rwang Pam Stadium in Jos, on Saturday as playing against the match official.
“We played against the referee and not Warri Wolves,” began the Juth skipper in his claim. “He was against us in his officiating. Imagine, he denied us three glaring penalty calls. It is a pity we lost in that manner.”
Head coach of Juth FC, Tunde Abdulrahman, also took sides with his captain and branded the referee a killjoy.
But Abdulrahman added that his men were unlucky with their chances against Warri Wolves.
“I think two things contributed to our loss today (Saturday). First, we were not lucky and the other is that the referee was out to see that we did not win. How could the referee turn down all those handling of the ball in the box by players of Warri Wolves?
“We played well but those are the reasons we did not win the game. I won’t let this affect my boys as we will go back and strategise ahead of our next game,” he said.
The Healers’ next game will be a trip to Kaduna United for a Week 5 game on December 5.
We need to hurriedly get past the level of having officials blamed everytime (or maybe we just need better officiating). It used to be the away team blaming the ref, now the home team?
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