Scott Parker was left frustrated that Marcus Edwards did not get a late penalty in Burnley’s 0-0 draw with Preston in the Sky Bet Championship.
Controversy struck in the 90th minute when the on-loan Sporting star went down under a sliding challenge from Lewis Gibson but referee Anthony Kitchen waved away the spot-kick appeals.
Burnley manager Parker said: “It’s a penalty for me and I don’t think I’m being biased in my understanding of it. Marcus Edwards has touched the ball first and then he’s touched it onto the player who’s slid on the ground onto that player.
“The referee said to me that the defender got the ball. He didn’t get the ball. If the defender’s running with the ball and I want to tackle him, I have to get contact with the ball first.”
More controversy happened midway through the second half as Milutin Osmajic got involved in a heated verbal exchange with Hannibal Mejbri, and Parker confirmed that his midfielder has reported the incident.
“Something inappropriate was said to Hannibal which he reported,” Parker said. “You could clearly see he was very distressed and in that moment we tried to get some context into what exactly had happened because he was very emotional.
“He explained to me what was said and at that moment we just wanted to work out how he was and where he was in his head space. It will go down to due process now.”
On the game, Parker added: “[Preston] make it very difficult and you’ve got to stand up to a certain fight. The facts are that we didn’t get the result and we’re disappointed that we didn’t win the game because we fully deserved to but we didn’t put our chances away today.”
Paul Heckingbottom was in the stands due to a pitchside suspension but he was keen to praise the officials.
With regard to the penalty incident, the Preston manager said: “It’s exactly what I thought. Lewis got something on the ball because I saw the ball jump straight away.”
On the verbal spat between Osmajic and Mejbri, Heckingbottom said: “It looks like there’s some allegation that [Osmajic] has said something.
“At the moment, it’s ‘he said, she said’. It looked like the referee handled it well in terms of the procedures and what’s meant to happen. I don’t know what the cause of it was but I think the referee handled it well.”
On the draw, Heckingbottom added: “I enjoyed it, as much as I can when I’m not on the sidelines. There was an intensity to it that represented top-end Championship play because that’s what Burnley bring and that’s us.
“That’s two games we’ve had against them. The margins are so fine and as we’ve shown against all the teams at the top, if that’s our level then we’d be up there with them.
“It’s a good indication that we’re more than capable of competing in this division.”
