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Football London
Football London
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Rob Guest

Matt Doherty makes big claim about Harry Kane's disallowed goal in Tottenham's loss at Chelsea

Matt Doherty has questioned the decision to disallow Harry Kane's first-half strike in Tottenham's 2-0 defeat against Chelsea on Sunday.

Under pressure early on as the hosts took the game to them and looked to take an early lead, Spurs remained strong at the back and frustrated the Champions League holders with their resolute defending.

Barely laying a glove on Chelsea at the other end of the pitch, Spurs broke just before half-time and managed to find the net with Harry Kane collecting Ryan Sessegnon's cross and finding the bottom corner after a sharp turn in the box.

However, the goal was ruled out with the Spurs striker adjudged to have fouled Thiago Silva in the box by pushing him in the back.

Tottenham were not happy at all about Paul Tierney's decision and some players duly confronted him at half-time and before the restart, with head coach Antonio Conte not happy in his post-match press conference about the "incredible" call to disallow the strike.

Giving his thoughts on the 2-0 defeat after the game in west London, Doherty was asked about the big talking point and claimed that he believed the linesman had actually given the foul on Thiago Silva rather than the referee.

"For sure. I didn’t realise that there was even suspicions of a foul when the ball went in," said the Republic of Ireland international.

"I haven’t see it back actually so I don’t actually know what it was for.

Harry Kane was not happy about the decision to disallow his goal against Chelsea and made his feelings clear at half-time (James Williamson - AMA/Getty Images)

When told that there was a hand in Thiago Silva's back that saw the goal controversially ruled out, Doherty added: "Well, I don’t even think they were appealing too toughly for it. It was strange because I heard the linesman gave the foul not the referee and the referee was standing five yards away."

Feeling that they should have been 1-0 up at the break courtesy of Kane's strike, Conte's men found themselves behind two minutes after the restart following Hakim Ziyech's curling effort from outside the box.

Eight minutes later and it was two after Thiago Silva converted Mason Mount's inswinging free-kick to double the advantage.

Spurs felt the foul for the free-kick was soft but Doherty bemoaned his side's failure to defend the delivery as they conceded from yet another set piece.

"Yeah, we feel it was soft," he said on the decision to award the free-kick. "Again I haven’t see it back but we still conceded from a set piece. It’s not good enough, we’ve conceded from too many.

"I think it’s four or five games now quite recently where we’ve conceded from them, they’re cheap, sloppy goals to give teams.

"It’s hard, Premier League is a tough division and when you give people goals like that it’s not easy."

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