Matt Donohue\u2019s role in the derby has drawn renewed attention after the Video Assistant Referee was involved in the decision that led to Erling Haaland\u2019s winning goal for Manchester City on Sunday. The error was not his first controversial moment involving Manchester United, though it may be the one that keeps him away from their fixtures for some time.<\/p>\n
Following the incident, Donohue and assistant Blake Antrobus have not been given a Premier League appointment for the coming weekend. The Daily Mail also reports that the pair have been \u201cblocking\u201d from taking charge of any United matches \u201cfor the foreseeable future.\u201d<\/p>\n
That latest development will do little to change the mood around United, where Michael Carrick was already unimpressed by any talk of an apology from Pro Ref. \u201cYeah, that\u2019d be great, that. Yeah, I can\u2019t wait for that one,\u201d he said, dripping with sarcasm.<\/p>\n
The tension between Donohue and United goes back to March, when the official was on the touchline as fourth official in a match against Bournemouth. Harry Maguire was dismissed for denying a clear goalscoring opportunity, shortly after Amad Diallo had been on the end of a similar challenge that went unpunished. Donohue later wrote in his report: \u201cIn the 78th minute of the game, referee Stuart Attwell sent off Manchester United #5 Harry Maguire,\u201d Donohue wrote in his report . \u201cAfter the VAR check was complete, Maguire, as he was leaving the field of play, approached me and shouted, \u2018You\u2019re a joke. You\u2019re all a f—ing joke.\u2019 I am reporting the matter to the Football Association for further review.\u201d<\/p>\n
Maguire denied using abusive language and said: \u201cI did not use abusive and\/or insulting words towards the fourth official or any other match official. As I left the field of play following my dismissal, I said something along the lines of \u2018it is a f—ing joke.\u2019 I am certain that I did not call the fourth official or any match official, a joke or use any other form of insult.\u201d<\/p>\n
Donohue maintained that the remark was \u201caimed collectively at the group of officials,\u201d and the FA upheld that view with an additional one-match ban for United\u2019s defender.<\/p>\n
Carrick also took issue with the derby decision itself, saying: \u201cI don\u2019t really know how you go and get another explanation on that one,\u201d before adding, \u201cI think we all understand what that rule means [regarding interfering with play], and it\u2019s pretty obvious. It\u2019s as obvious as it gets.\u201d<\/p>\n
The controversy is not limited to United, either. In March 2023, Sheffield United\u2019s late winner against Sunderland also brought a disputed reading of the offside law into focus, with Tommy Doyle\u2019s free kick dropping into the bottom corner after Sander Berge had attempted to reach it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Donohue\u2019s derby error has revived old United tensions and fresh questions over his VAR calls.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":19418,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[238,179,2024],"tags":[1836,59,180],"class_list":["post-19419","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-manchester-city","category-manchester-united","category-refereeing","tag-2026-27-premier-league","tag-featured","tag-player-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19419","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19419"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19419\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19418"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19419"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19419"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19419"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}