Cox fury as referee Drysdale takes centre stage again

Drysdale, who has fallen foul of the Stags’ faithful in the past, had already angered Mansfield when he sent off James Alabi for next to nothing as Stags finished with nine men in a 3-0 defeat at Southend earlier in the season.

Tonight he gave York both penalty decisions while denying Stags two of their own that looked blatant as well as deciding not to show Ryan Bowman a red card for what Stags felt was a flailing elbow in the face of John Dempster.

City put away the first of the two penalties to seal a fourth successive away win, Alan Marriott saving the second, and Cox raged: “I am not usually scathing of referees as I think they have the hardest job in football.

“But I think something has to be done at the FA with people who are consistently poor.

“The referee should have a good look in his mirror tonight and analyse his performance.

“He missed so much stuff in their box, including two blatant penalties.

“When you see Matt Rhead’s shirt being pulled above his chest in the box you expect something to be done about it.

“Rheady was also kicked in the head in the first half but nothing was done about it.

“All you want is consistency and I thought he was consistent tonight but not in the right way. He saw things that no else could see.

“Once again both teams were scratching their heads for the second penalty. Everyone was bemused why or how.

“He wouldn’t give us penalties, yet he was brave enough to say to me at half-time that he was unsighted for their first penalty and blamed his lineswomen for giving it, yet she never raised her flag or put it across her chest.”

He went on: “I am feeling a bit cheated to be honest and I feel sorry for the fans as they were cheated too tonight.

“They are not stupid. They could see things happen.

“You want referees to be honest with you and I don’t think he was honest with us tonight.

“We worked extremely hard tonight. We huffed and puffed, though there was not a lot of quality in the final third. The boys gave everything.

“The game should definitely have finished 0-0.

“We have got to be resolute now and come back from the disappointment tonight and get back to winning games.”

However, York boss Nigel Worthington said: “I though the officials stood up well to the situation tonight.

“It was a very hostile crowd for them to deal with and, in fairness, I think they got most of their decisions right and the two penalties for us were spot on. No one likes having penalties given against them.

“The pressure on us is part and parcel of football. Probably last year coming here we wouldn’t have dealt with it. But we have got some fresh faces in now and a new mentality and we have come away with the three points.

“You have got to deal with it or Mansfield will overpower you and go on to win it. We were absolutely fantastic tonight and deserved to win through our endeavour.

“We are still playing catch-up this season and one or two sides around us have games in hand. So there is nothing to get excited about. We will just keep going, see what points we get and go from there.

“Wes (Fletcher) missed the penalty at the end, which I think is the first one he’s missed for us, but thankfully we slotted the first one away and that gave us the three points.”