Premier League referee prone to the occasional error

After Newcastle became the latest team to be denied important points as a result of a mistake by referee Rob Styles, The Spoiler decided to look at who else have fallen victim to his calamitous decision making in recent years.

In goal is Shay Given, who made what deserved to be a match-winning save from Stephen Ireland last night but wasn’t because Manchester City were afforded another opportunity to break down Newcastle’s ten men and scored.

Our left-back is Jlloyd Samuel, whose great tackle on Cristiano Ronaldo last month was punished when Styles pointed to the spot. Accompanying Habib Beye, who is a makeshift centre-back due to Styles’ habit of making costly errors against right-backs, is Stoke’s Ibrahima Sonko, who was adjudged to have fouled Obafemi Martins in Reading’s 3-2 loss at St James’ Park in December 2006, a decision his boss Steve Coppell labelled “a guess-timate”. Steve Finnan completes the defence after Rob Styles famously pointed to the spot last season when Florent Malouda ran into the Irishman with Liverpool beating Chelsea 1-0.

On the wings are

Bolton boss harbours no bad feelings towards Rob Styles

When Gary Megson’s described Rob Styles’ decision to point to the spot after Jlloyd Samuel’s impressive challenge on Cristiano Ronaldo as “hugely embarrassing”, there were few people who blamed him.

Yes, a big deal has been made of the FA’s Respect campaign but if you see your team’s chances of taking a priceless point at Old Trafford robbed by a ridiculously refereeing decision, nobody expects you to stay calm.

So it is somewhat surprising that the Bolton boss has today told his club’s website that after speaking to Rob Styles, he has forgiven him for his error, even going as far as to say that he would welcome the blundering official back to the Reebok:

“It’s gone now and we can’t do anything about it. It was an error and everybody knew it was an error, but

Another weekend, another handful of bogus penalties…

Another week of Premier League action has passed and once again it’s the officials who have been rattling football cages. Rob Styles, a smartly dressed ref, confused Jlloyd Samuel’s excellent tackle on Ronaldo with an uncoordinated lunge, and immediately pointed to the spot. Diarra handled the ball for Portsmouth and got away with it, and Steve Bennett awarded a perfectly decent penalty, albeit one involving the most elaborate Willem Defoe from Platoon impression The Spoiler has ever seen.

Everyone’s been yapping their disapproval, is it time we just said to hell with it and demanded video evidence? Bolton probably think so…