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Michael O’Neill was left fuming at a goal that “clearly should have been disallowed” after Northern Ireland’s hopes of progressing from World Cup qualifying Group A were ended. slovakia Kosice debutant Tomas Bobsek suffered a 1–0 stoppage-time defeat.
Bobsek, who was on the pitch for only three minutes, came on after failing to deal with a corner from Bailey Peacock-Farrell, but northern ireland They were angry that a foul was not given as Daniel Ballard went down under pressure from Leo Sawyer.
This was added in the first minute of eight, and there was further misery for shorthanded Northern Ireland as Ballard was shown a second yellow card to earn a red, while O’Neill was booked by referee Istvan Kovacs after the final whistle.
Slovakia had already seen attacks from Lukas Harslin and David Strelec ruled for offside and handball respectively in the second half.
Northern Ireland finished the night assured of a place in the qualifying play-offs League of Nations after croatia Green Faroe Islands 3-1, but disappointment was the primary emotion.
“You’re always disappointed when you lose a game late, as we did, especially by a goal that clearly should have been disallowed,” O’Neill said. “There’s an obvious push on Daniel Ballard in the corner, two hands on his back.
“The other two goals that were disallowed should have been disallowed. The first goal was offside, the lines clearly show that, the second goal was handball.
“You have to look at each event on its own merit, you can’t look at it cumulatively and referee the last event differently to the way you referee the other two events. That’s what (VAR) is for…
“Bailey knows he should have done better. He comes in when maybe he doesn’t need to come in… but ultimately it’s still a foul.”
Asked what he said to the referee after the match, O’Neill said: “I told the referee he needed to be stronger and he booked me. But I went to shake his hand. I said, ‘You need to be stronger’ and that was enough for him to book me. If I’m not allowed to say that, I shouldn’t have said it.”
O’Neill was also unhappy with the Slovakian bench, which erupted in wild celebration after the winning goal, with home coach Francesco Calzona refusing to shake hands at the final whistle.
In a tense, scrappy game in which the best chances for both teams came from set-pieces, Northern Ireland – lacking Shea Charles, Ali McCann and Ethan Galbraith in midfield – fought hard but struggled to find any fluidity.
“There were some aspects of the performance that could have been better,” O’Neill said. “There’s no doubt about it. I thought the players who came in, Brad Lyons did very well, George Saville did very well, Ruairi (McConville) was excellent, just a young player coming into this type of game.
“We were probably missing five starters from our team and that meant a lot for us. The game was decided on set-pieces and Slovakia were better than us in set-pieces. Our deliveries were not as good and we missed Shea’s delivery.”