Bradford City Football Club News

• Nickname:The Bantams
• Founded:1903
• Manager:Phil Parkinson

• Ground:Valley Parade
• Capacity:25,136

Wetherall's red card rage

26 Mar 2007 - 11:44:54

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Bradford City caretaker manager David Wetherall blamed the controversial dismissal of Steven Schumacher for his side's 3-1 home defeat to Blackpool.

The loss - the Bantams' fourth defeat in five games - leaves City only one point above the bottom four with seven games of the season left, but it was Schumacher's sending-off when the score was 1-1 that was crucial to the final result, according to Wetherall.

A furious Wetherall told the Telegraph & Argus: "I've obviously got to be very careful what I say about it, but from my view 30 yards away it was just a 50-50 tackle. We were as likely to get a free-kick as they were.

"I was pretty upset when the referee gave a free-kick against Schuey and absolutely amazed that he then sent him off. It seemed a fairly innocuous incident but the referee must have seen something different to me.

"There seems to be an unwritten rule in football that the second booking has to be a worse foul than the first one. But that certainly wasn't the case.

"Schuey made a couple of rash challenges before that, but he's of the opinion he played the ball in the tackle.

"I don't think there's any doubt that it changed the game because we were well on top at the time."