Former Premier League referee Mark Clattenburg stunned fans when he admitted that “allowed” Tottenham Hotspur to “self-destruct” against Chelsea in their 2-2 draw at Stamford Bridge in the 2015-16 campaign.
While speaking on NBC’s Men In Blazers podcast, the County Durham-born referee revealed that he purposefully did not send off any Spurs fans during the game as he did not want to be blamed for the club’s title demise.
The contest was a fiery affair between the London rivals, who broke out into two mass melees during play.
Nine yellow cards were brandished to Spurs players, who handed the English crown to shock winners Leicester City as a result of failing to beat Chelsea.
Clattenburg’s claims have caused quite a stir, but Tottenham manager Mauricio Pochettino has refused to be drawn into the debate.
According to Sky Sports, when asked about the remarks, the Argentine told reporters:
“No comment. Two years ago, no comment. Sorry I’m not going to say anything.”
Pochettino did, though, answer when asked if referees should speak about the matches that they oversee.
“I don’t know. It’s so difficult to talk about that subject. My position now is I want to be away and I don’t want to talk about the decision of the referee. I don’t want to talk about their behaviour. I don’t want to talk about if they were good or no good.
“I understand that it’s so difficult. It’s not easy to be a referee. We can see in every single training session when I’m in the middle of two groups when they are competing it’s so tough to say ‘foul, no foul’, ‘handball, no handball’, ‘penalty, no penalty’ or ‘it wasn’t a red card, it’s a yellow card’.
“We are the first to know their job is so difficult but I think I try to help them. It’s better to stay quiet and say nothing because I’m not going to help if I say some comments.”
