Referee Anthony Taylor has explained why Kevin Schade’s goal in Brentford’s win over Manchester United was allowed to stand.
After falling behind to Mason Mount’s goal in the 14th minute, the equalised not too long after as Luke Shaw put the ball into his own net after deflecting Mikkel Damsgaard’s effort past Altay Bayindir.
The strike that put Brentford ahead was surrounded in controversy as Matthijs de Ligt lunged into close down Yoanne Wissa but ended up injuring himself in the process.
Though despite the centre-back going straight down and signalling to the bench that he needed to come off, Brentford carried on playing and eventually scored through Schade.
The Man United players were clearly unhappy that Taylor did not stop the game. Appearing on Sky Sports’ Monday Night Football programme, the official offered an explanation by insisting he did not feel the Dutchman was not seriously injured.
“The main consideration in this situation was basically my responsibility under the laws is to decide if de Ligt is seriously injured or not.
“If it’s a serious injury then it’s my responsibility to stop the game at that moment.”
Then when asked by Jamie Carragher as to how he knew de Ligt’s injury wasn’t serious enough to stop the game, Taylor said: “Generally you will consider a serious injury, a head injury in the main and so in this situation because of him sitting up asking for treatment, I haven’t considered that serious and so that’s why we allowed the game to continue and the goal resulted from that.”
Taylor went on to say de Ligt fouled Wissa as he said: “Absolutely, if we analyse it a little bit more it’s probably more a foul by de Ligt on Wissa than the other way.
“Particularly in the Premier League these days there is a greater expectation that we let a lot more of the physical contact go.”
🗣️ "If we analyse it more, it's more of a foul by de Ligt"@Carra23 and Anthony Taylor analyse Brentford's second goal as Matthijs de Ligt suffered an injury in the build-up 🤕🔎 pic.twitter.com/py4lIb4Qtl
— Sky Sports Premier League (@SkySportsPL) May 5, 2025
De Ligt was immediately replaced as Harry Maguire came on, leaving Ruben Amorim sweating over the defender’s fitness ahead of Thursday’s Europa League semi-final second leg against Athletic Club.
“I don't know so I'm really concerned - not about Thursday,” Amorim said when asked for an update on the Dutchman.
“We took off Luke Shaw at half-time to protect and have players for Thursday, but I'm more concerned whether it is a small or big injury and thinking about next season.”
