Carey: Ref could have caused a riot
By Rob Griffiths, Daily Post
16 October 2007
WREXHAM
are considering making a complaint regarding referee Lee Probert following
Saturday’s defeat at Macclesfield.
Probert sent-off midfielder Robbie Garrett for a second bookable offence with
eight minutes to go in the 3-2 defeat at Moss Rose with Wrexham leading 2-1 at
the time, a decision which alone riled up Dragons boss Brian Carey.
But in the wake of the defeat it now appears Probert made some gestures towards
the Wrexham fans and for that reason the club are contemplating official action.
Manager Carey said: “When you have a referee apparently ridiculing our fans in
the first half then you just can’t have that.
“He’s made a decision which has seen our supporters in up roar and then in turns
out that he has made a gesture with his tongue to the fans.
“It’s laughable, you can’t have an official, the decision maker on the field
making gestures to the fans.
“At one point I thought it was going to get really out of hand, and there could
have been a riot. Our fans were in real up roar about it.
“This is not going to get the three points back, we know that.
“The supporters haven’t got a lot to shout about at the moment, we were winning
2-1 and you don’t expect the referee to do things like that.”
Club secretary Geraint Parry added: “A handful of supporters have contacted us
after the game to say that the referee waggled his tongue at fans during the
first half.
“But until we can find out exactly what happened we don’t know exactly what
action we will be taking.”
Goals from Michael Proctor and Chris Llewellyn saw Wrexham open up an early 2-0,
before Martin Gritton pulled one back before the break.
And Wrexham still held the lead going into the final few minutes of injury time,
before strikes from David Morley and Danny Thomas wrestled the points out of the
Dragons grasp and left them third from bottom in the table.
Carey added: “We have come out of a game with Macclesfield again and yet for the
second time we are talking about the referee as the main talking point.
“We were harshly dealt with in the sending off of Robbie Garrett and that
completely changed the game.
“The game was nearly over and we let them back into the game and it has cost us
three points.”
But while was scathing of Probert for his actions during the match, including
the second booking of Garrett for an altercation with Macc goalkeeper Tommy Lee
– which was instigated by the Silkmen’s stopper – Carey also hit out at his own
players.
“We need to be more ruthless,” said the former Dragons no-nonsense centre-back.
“Once again our soft centre was exposed and a little bit of uncertainty has cost
us the game.
“I thought we had hit some good form and should have won three out of our last
four games, rather than two from four, and we really felt we had turned a
corner.
“But a poor decision and some bad defending has seen us throw the points away.”