Adelaide United coach Rini Coolen believes referee Chris Beath erred in showing Paul Reid a red card for his collision with Gold Coast United defender John Curtis in Wednesday night’s scoreless draw.
Reid and Curtis were involved in a heavy clash late in the game that saw Curtis carried off the field with a neck brace, prompting Beath to give Reid his marching orders despite waiting for at least five minutes to do so.
Coolen speculated that Gold Coast coach Miron Bleiberg’s spat with Melbourne Victory over their physical style could have held some influence over the decision.
“The first reaction from the referee was that he could give him a red card, that’s what we heard. I thought maybe he changed his mind but it was actually a decision he made before,” Coolen said.
“I thought maybe it had something to do with what (Bleiberg) said in the last few days about hard tackles. Maybe he should not say that but it’s something if you’re involved with the game (that you think about). I can understand a little bit of what he meant. We don’t want those sort of tackles on the pitch from our opponent or our own players.”
“But it’s a contact sport and anything can happen and it’s not always worth a red card. Everyone is working hard to get a result and some things can happen, as long as it’s fair. Today was a fair game.”
“I think everyone saw it’s not a red card. When the referee sees the replay maybe he can consider it was the wrong decision. That’s what we all thought. It was a bad moment for both players and it could have been worse.”
Coolen said that the second scoreless stalemate between Adelaide and Gold Coast this season was a fair result after a somewhat uninspiring match.
“At the end of the day it was a fair result. Both teams, because of the circumstances, didn’t play fantastic football and both teams didn’t create a lot of chances.”
“But at the end of the game if you play with 10 players, you can take some risks and there could be a moment where you can score a goal but we didn’t create anything,” he said.
“(Second spot) is still possible so we have to fight for it until the last moment. It’s not in our hands so we have to play as good as possible, get the points and in the end find out where we finish. We can’t do any more than that.”
“We could have been lucky and won today. Nobody deserved the win, but both teams needed it.”
