Burton Albion manager Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink believes Aaron Collins "dived" to win the free-kick that led to Conor Shaughnessy's first-minute red card against Bristol Rovers on Saturday.
Collins pounced on a loose ball after just 20 seconds and referee Ross Joyce deemed he was tripped on the edge of the box by Shaughnessy, denying the Gas a clear goalscoring opportunity. A red card was shown, Antony Evans scored from the resulting free-kick and Joey Barton's side romped to a 4-0 win at a sun-soaked Pirelli Stadium to open their account in League One this season.
But Hasselbaink believes the Gas were fortunate to have the man advantage.
"I don’t think that it was a red card," he told the Press Association. "I have just seen it from the television and Conor touches the ball first and the boy dives. The referee is free-kick eager and he gives a red card. But then still we need to do better."
Speaking to Burton's club website, Hasselbaink added: "I’ve seen it. It’s very difficult to see but he touched the ball first and he puts a back pass and the boy goes down. That’s what it was.
"It’s not a red card, but it has been given. This referee has been here before and we know what happened then and it’s déjà vu."
Barton disagreed with Hasselbaink's version of events. He said: "I think the ref made the right call. They’ve left the pitch really long because of the style of football they want to play and it isn’t conducive to the way we want to play, which is a crisp passing game.
"They are entitled to do that, it’s their stadium, but it backfired on them. The ball sat up, the defender hesitated and Aaron’s athleticism and anticipation brought him onto the ball, he’s nudged it in front and he’s possibly going to go through and have a goalscoring opportunity, so the player has left the referee with nowhere to go really and it was the correct call."
Hasselbaink acknowledged the decision made the challenge very difficult for his players, but he believes his team could have done much better after falling four goals behind at the break.
"It’s a big dampener that the free-kick goes in," he added. "It shouldn’t and then you’re on the back foot, but still the performance after that was just not good enough.
"We were going to be suffering, we knew that, but you need to stay in the game and we have made so many mistakes.
"Heads dropped after the 1-0 and we didn’t do the work. The lines were too big from each other and then they could pick us off and put lots of balls behind us. We didn’t two goals at all, we need to do better and that’s the problem."
SIGN UP: To receive our free Rovers newsletter, bringing you the latest from the Mem
READ NEXT:
