Southampton: Hasenhuttl not happy with key decision in loss to Wolves

Southampton manager Ralph Hasenhuttl was no happy with a key decision in his side’s 3-2 loss to Wolves on Saturday.

Saints held a 2-0 lead at half-time but three second half strikes from Wolves saw the visitors to St Mary’s eventually claim the three points.

The equaliser that Wolves got came from the penalty spot after VAR overruled Darren England and Hasenhuttl felt that the decision to not give it should have stood.

Speaking to skysports.com after the game, the Austrian said:

"“It’s absolutely not a clear wrong decision [for the penalty]. I thought the referee was right. Cedric was in front of him and I don’t know why it was overruled, I can’t understand it. You can give it yes, but it is not a clear wrong decision and I heard VAR is only overruling clearly wrong decisions.”"

Overall, it is difficult to say that Wolves didn’t deserve a penalty in this incident.

Both Cedric and Jack Stephens made contact with Jonny Otto as he shaped to shoot inside the area and stopped the Wolves man in his tracks.

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Hasenhuttl’s argument that it was not a clear and obvious error is also not valid considering that a penalty should have been given and could have affected the result of the match had it not been awarded.

Instead, Saints and their manager must not dwell on this match and should learn quickly from it.

Up until half-time, the hosts were looking confident once again and secured a potentially match-winning lead after two nicely taken goals from Jan Bednarek and Shane Long.

However, Wolves had nothing to lose in the second period and pushed Adama Traore up against the two Saints central defenders with Raul Jimenez.

This is when Hasenhuttl should have reacted to give his side more of a chance in defence and when his players should have held onto the ball much better.

Nuno Espirito Santo clearly saw a fault in the setup that Saints have – as a few teams have at times this season – and exploited it really well.

Clearly Saints are not back in crisis yet after their impressive run of three wins and a draw from their four games before this loss, but the turnaround should be seen as a time to fully refocus ahead of upcoming matches.