Harry Maguire was told that Manchester United should have been given a penalty at Chelsea but it wasn’t given it due to the talk it would cause afterwards.
The stunning claims were made by Maguire’s teammate Luke Shaw, with Callum Hudson-Odoi avoiding being penalised despite the ball appearing to hit his hand inside his own box.
Shaw told Sky Sports: “If it’s not going to be a penalty, l don’t think they needed to stop the game.
“The ref even said to H [Harry Maguire] that ‘if I say it is a pen then it is going to cause a lot of talk afterwards’. H got told it was a penalty.
“I don’t understand why the game is stopped. It’s confusing with VAR.
“I’m not going to moan about it because l don’t think either team did enough to win.”
The match finished goalless, meaning Man United have lost more ground on Manchester City, who won at the weekend, in the Premier League title race.
Red Devils manager Ole Gunnar Solskjaer was furious with the decision, insisting it was ‘100 per cent’ a penalty and ‘two points have been taken away from us’.
Solskjaer’s response was also cryptic as he accused ‘outside influences’ of putting pressure on referees to not give his side decisions.
He told Sky Sports: “It’s not right, is it? It’s all these outside influences, even the VAR talk before the game on Harry, that’s cheeky. That’s cheeky when they put that on their website, that’s influencing referees!
“You read about what they say about the controversy about Harry Maguire, putting pressure on referees to give penalties against us.
“There’s loads of talk about us getting penalties… and now of course we should’ve had a penalty, that’s clear.”