Nuno Espirito Santo was left furious after James Maddison escaped punishment following an altercation with Ryan Yates during Tottenham’s victory over Nottingham Forest. An own goal from Murillo opened the scoring for Spurs, with Micky van de Ven and Pedro Porro also on target after Chris Wood’s first-half strike for Forest.
At one point, Yates was left furious after Maddison appeared to push him to the ground on the edge of Forest’s penalty area. He made a VAR gesture with his hands, signalling that he wanted the incident to be looked at, but nothing came of it and Maddison went unpunished.
Some viewers and Forest fans felt that Maddison had thrown a sly punch in the direction of Yates and took to social media to vent their frustration.
In his post-match press conference, Nuno insisted that Maddison should have been sent off for violent conduct and expressed his surprise that VAR officials decided not to intervene.
“I saw it, what I see is clear,” said Nuno, who was returning to former club Tottenham for the first time. “What they saw clearly is not the same as we saw. It’s a red card. I spoke to Yates and asked him and what he felt and I saw the images. I wouldn’t speak if I wasn’t 100 per cent sure.
“It is a red card. I think James Maddison loses his composure. I’m surprised VAR didn’t ask [referee] Simon Hooper to review it.”
The incident sparked plenty of debate after the final whistle, with Sky Sports pundit Roy Keane suggesting that Yates did not need to go to ground in the manner that he did.
“I worked with Yates at Forest, really nice kid, but every week somebody touches him he goes down,” said Keane. “He goes down far too easily. For such a decent lad, he needs to cut that out of his game.”
Fellow pundit Jamie Redknapp also sided with Maddison over the incident, adding: “It’s not a lot. Yates is like that, he tries to get into players’ faces, a bit like [Paul] Gascoigne and Vinnie Jones many years ago.”
The result saw Tottenham leapfrog Aston Villa into fourth place in the Premier League table on goal difference. The north Londoners also have a game in hand over Unai Emery’s men, who were held to a draw by Brentford in a six-goal thriller on Saturday.
