Man United handed new West Ham penalty verdict as Howard Webb stance emerges after Erik ten Hag sack

Professional Game Match Officials Limited (PGMOL) chief Howard Webb believes that West Ham should not have been awarded a controversial late penalty that ultimately led to the sacking of Erik ten Hag at Manchester United, according to reports.

The Times report that Webb, who oversees the refereeing in the English game, believes that an error was made in VAR intervening to award a penalty to the Hammers against United. Jarrod Bowen converted the spot kick to give West Ham a 2-1 win.

Less than 24 hours later, United confirmed that Erik ten Hag had left the club. He has since been replaced by Ruben Amorim, who will officially start his role during the upcoming international break.

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With the score at 1-1 at the London Stadium, Danny Ings fell to the ground in the penalty area after a clash with United defender Matthijs de Ligt. Despite there not being any appeals from the Hammers, VAR, Michael Oliver intervened and sent referee David Coote to take a look at the incident again on the pitchside monitor.

After several replays the referee overturned his original decision and awarded the penalty. The result left United in 14th place in the table with 11 points from their opening nine games.

The decision to award a penalty has been widely criticised and questioned. It now seems that Webb is among those who don’t think the decision should have been overturned, with the Key Match Incident Panel also reported to have judged the decision to have been wrong.

The incident may be discussed on the latest episode of the Mic’s Up programme, which will be broadcast next week. It’s not the first time that the PGMOL chief has had to admit that a mistake has been made against United this season, with Bruno Fernandes winning an appeal against the red card shown to him against Spurs earlier in the campaign.