North-East Sport

Sweeney stunned by denial

By Nick Loughlin

10:36am Monday 6th September 2010

ANTONY Sweeney admits he was stunned when he was denied a late penalty at the weekend The Hartlepool United midfielder was set to turn in an 88th minute leveller at MK Dons before Sean O’Hanlon knocked him over.

The defender got away with it, as referee Craig Pawson waved play on, much to the disbelief of the Pools’ camp.

“There you go, it says it all that their manager reckoned it was a penalty – it’s not very often that happens,’’ said Sweeney.

“The chance was there for me to score, I was just waiting to whack the ball in and I was pushed over. He knocked me off balance and I couldn’t get enough on it.

“Everyone thought it was a penalty except the referee.

Maybe the sending-off influenced the decision and he didn’t want to be seen to be against the home side.

“For the red card, it was a ball over the back and Leon (McSweeney) was quick, got on the blind side and was pulled back. As a defender and from their point of view it was a good foul as they came away with a win.’’ Pools were compact defensively, but one slip cost the game, when Sweeney was robbed of possession.

But the midfielder, who has started the season well after being given the freedom to charge forward from deep, admitted: “Maybe they were a bit fortunate, but we should have defended for their goal a bit better.

“We had possession and plenty of the ball in the closing minutes, they had a man sent-off, we threw men forward and created chances.

But we never managed to get the goal.

“Next weekend is important now. Coming to a place like this is hard, but we could have ground out a 0-0, a decent point, but we have a couple of games in which we fancy our chances now.

“As an away side, these are a decent side who are going to have lots of possession, especially with someone like Didi Hamann in there who is going to pass it around.

“With a lot of possession without hurting us or getting down the sides, it would have been a good point.”

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