Barnet manager Dean Brennan has hit out at referee Sunny Gill after the match official seemingly missed a clear hair pull on goalscorer Idris Kanu during the 1-1 draw with Exeter City on Tuesday night.
Brennan’s side survived an early onslaught as the hosts aggressively laid siege on the Barnet goal but spurned numerous early chances before Kanu rolled in the opener on the hour mark.
The Bees’ lead didn’t last long, however, as Reece Cole fired in the hosts’ equaliser just seven minutes later to snatch a point.
Despite an important point secured on the road, Brennan felt that referee Sunny Gill missed a clearer red card offence which would have seen Exeter reduced to ten men.
“To get 1-0 up in the time that we did and to not make it 2-0 with two great chances, we never did that, and that cost us,” said Brennan.
“I’m respectful of the point, but my main feeling is the referee, Sonny, has a duty of care to protect my players and every player on that pitch. He’s telling me that he didn’t see a hair pull. He saw the hair pull because I’ve seen it back. I saw straight away that it was a hair pull, and he was watching the incident.
“He’ll tell you that he hasn’t seen it, but he’s seen it. It’s the worst hair pull I’ve seen. He’s pulled Idris’ hair all the way back and out. It’s really poor officiating. For no official to see that whatsoever is unacceptable on their behalf. For them to then cop out and say they haven’t seen it, I’m not happy with that. It’s disgraceful and it’s not right.”
Barnet thought they had taken the lead in the eighth minute when Danny Collinge hooked the ball into the back of the Exeter net, but the goal was ruled out for a dubious offside call.
“We’ll get another apology tonight. We've scored, and it’s been ruled out for offside,” said Brennan. “You can see it straight away (that Collinge was onside). What are they (the officials) looking at?
“That’s the third goal we’ve had chalked off in the last five games, and it should have been a goal. We should have had a goal.”
Barnet struggled to implement their typically slick passing rhythm but found themselves ahead when Kanu rolled the ball into an empty net following a loose save from Exeter goalkeeper Jack Bycroft.
On the performance, Brennan conceded: “We plugged away, but we weren’t at our fluent best. They (Exeter) are not going to let you do that here. We kept going, and we spoke at half-time about doing our best to keep our clean sheet. In the first half, all in all, they were probably slightly stronger than us.
“Did we have enough quality today? No. Was our output good enough? No. A draw is probably a fair result, and that’s the truth. We’ve just got to lick our wounds and go on to the next game.”
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