West Ham United manager David Moyes feels it is worth appealing the recent FA charge given to the club following their 1-1 draw with Southampton last weekend.
On Thursday, the Hammers were given an FA charge over a breach of rule E20.1, with Moyes’ side given until Monday to respond following failure to control their players during Sunday’s 1-1 draw with Southampton.
In the 20th minute, Southampton opened the scoring through Romain Perraud’s deflected effort but it was an incident that was full of controversy. First, West Ham’s boss has said he and the players were unaware that Kyle Walker-Peters was allowed to stand well over the line to take a long throw-in, with only his heel touching the line at the point of release.
READ MORE: Every word David Moyes said on West Ham's Bournemouth clash, Jarrod Bowen and Steven Gerrard
After a Che Adams flick-on and Tomas Soucek’s mis-hit clearance, Jarrod Bowen went to chase down the ball, but was accidentally blocked off by referee Peter Bankes, with Perraud going on to score seconds later after a shot deflected off Ben Johnson.
That led to complaints from several West Ham players, leading to the FA charge, which Moyes said he could “laugh” about during a press conference on Friday.
Asked later in the press conference whether or not he thinks it is worth appealing, Moyes said he thinks that the Hammers should, citing a lack of education to himself and the players on the throw-in rules, as well as no common sense being used by Bankes in the build-up to the goal.
“I actually do think it is worth appealing,” said Moyes. "My reason is that the players were unsure of the rules. It might not be the FA but it needs somebody to be clear on the rules.
"When the referee blocks you from getting the ball and a goal comes from it immediately, then you have to explain why. Also, it looks that most people in football are not aware that you can put your foot way over the line and as long as your heel is on the line then that's acceptable.
"I think if you ask supporters they are all still of the belief that you can't put your whole foot over. And if you think about the heel being on the line, quite often you have to take your heel off to elevate the throw. Education of supporters and players - and managers because I have got to say I wasn't aware of it - is needed because players are saying they are not accepting that what you are doing is right.”
Referee Bankes did not overrule the goal or feel he was disrupting Bowen due to not directly touching the ball and although by the laws, it is correct, he did not decide that he was obstructing Bowen when clearly in his way.
Moyes has questioned whether in that incident again, should his players have to tackle a referee in order to win the ball back and prevent a repeat of the costly incident at St Mary’s last Sunday.
"If the referee blocks your line to get to the ball, what do we do next time?” Moyes added. “Do we take the referee out to get to the ball?
"If we go through the back of the referee to get to the ball then what happens? Does the referee blow up for a foul on him? Swallow his whistle?
"I don't see how you don't referee with common sense. I think referees do but on this occasion he refereed with no common sense whatsoever.”
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