Nottingham Forest should have been awarded their first penalty of the season against Hull City, according to captain Ben Watson.
The Reds believe Oliver Langford should have pointed to the spot in the 66th minute when former Forest skipper Eric Lichaj bundled into Sammy Ameobi after a long pass from Brice Samba.
Langford waved away those protests and Hull, leading 2-1 at the time, then had Josh Magennis dismissed for a rash tackle on Watson, but held on to inflict a second successive league defeat on Forest,
The Reds’ dressing room was far from happy.
"We’ve seen the penalty shouts back and the one on Sammy Ameobi is definitely a penalty. He’s pretty much chopped him in half,” Watson told Nottinghamshire Live.
“Those little decisions never went with us and we had a couple of chances towards the end.”
Hull found themselves 2-0 at the City Ground thanks to goals from Magennis and Jarrod Bowen. Matty Cash’s perseverance hauled Forest back into the game, but despite enjoying plenty of late pressure Sabri Lamouchi’s men were unable to find a way through.
“We stuck at it, we kept going,” said Watson.
“Joe Lolley’s shot at the end, that was going in and the defender got in the way of it. We also had a header from a set-piece.
“We had a lot of possession and a couple of decisions didn’t go our way, but Hull were ruthless on the counter attack.
“When you concede two goals in a game, it is difficult to win it but it is no time to panic.”
Thankfully for Lamouchi and his team, they don’t have long to wait before being presented with a chance to put things right. Reading are the visitors on Saturday, and Watson has called on his teammates to hit the standards they did before the international break, which saw them top the table and go unbeaten in 10 games.
“We have lost the last two games but we are still in a healthy position in the league with another home game on Saturday,” said the Reds midfielder.
“We know we can do better and we have to get back to the standards we set before the international break.
“We can’t panic or start blaming each other, we have still had a fantastic start to the season and if we win again on Saturday then it is all forgotten about.”
