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Rio Ferdinand, Owen Hargreaves and Shaun Wright-Phillips were left in shock at Manchester City being denied a handball offense in their 1-1 UEFA Champions League last-16 tie against RB Leipzig.
Manchester City failed to gain the upper hand against the Bundesliga outfit at the Red Bull Arena on Wednesday (February 22). After Riyad Mahrez opened the scoring in the 27th minute, Josko Gvardiol leveled things with a header from a corner kick in the 70th minute.
Pep Guardiola's side were left aggrieved in the final minute of added time when an alleged handball from Benjamin Henrichs was ignored. Despite appeals from the Cityzens, referee Serdar Gozubuyuk refused to look into the incident and blew the full-time whistle moments later.
Speaking on BT Sport, Hargreaves shared his thoughts on Henrichs' offense in the closing stages of the continental contest. He elaborated:
"He's playing volleyball! It's a handball. What is he doing? He's scared of it! It's no wonder Pep was annoyed. Pretty much all the players around have got their arms up, everyone. The players' reactions are usually quite telling in these kind of situations.
"Pep thought he saw it and he was quite a long way away. I think it's surprising to say the least that they didn't make a penalty decision there."
Ferdinand, who represented Manchester United 455 times, added:
"That's handball, you know. He's tried to push it away. You watch the Manchester City players' reactions, that tells you all you need to know there. They all react and they all go to the referee. Yeah, it does [look like volleyball]... he looks scared of the ball even!"
Wright-Phillips, a former Manchester City man, also pitched in, saying:
"That's a clear handball. You can't go like that. I can't believe it. I don't understand how VAR has not flagged this for the referee to even have a look at it. It doesn't make any sense to me whatsoever."
Manchester City are set to face RB Leipzig for their UEFA Champions League last-16 second leg at the Etihad on Tuesday (March 14).
Former Premier League referee delivers his verdict on Manchester City handball incident
Speaking on BT Sport, former referee Peter Walton claimed that the Cityzens were denied a clear penalty at the Red Bull Arena. He said:
"From the angles that we're all seeing here, I thought there was a handball offense there. The defender's arm is in an unnatural position for that phase of play. The ball clearly strikes [his hands] from the angles that we're seeing. But the VAR did not check it."
Sharing his thoughts on VAR's role, Walton continued:
"I have a monitor linked with UEFA that tells me when VAR are checking incidents and this particular incident was not checked and I'm surprised it wasn't. If there's an angle where it strikes his shoulder, then I understand it. But I haven't seen that angle and from what we've seen today and for me that was a handball offense."
