One Sunderland ace has been compared to Diego Maradona after what he did against Leeds United last night.
Sunderland claimed a point on their trip to Elland Road last night, leaving them unbeaten against Leeds United this season.
The Black Cats adopted a similar formation to the one that beat the Whites at the Stadium of Light before Christmas, and while they struggled to create chances, their defensive resilience certainly paid off.
It was Sunderland’s fourth clean sheet in five games and it brought an end to Leeds’ nine-game winning streak on home soil.
The Black Cats were lucky to keep a clean sheet though, with the hosts arguing two penalty decisions – one in each half.
Dan Ballard got into plenty of trouble in the first half, having been booked after 20 minutes.
The defender then appeared to deflect the ball away from goal with his arm, but it wasn’t spotted by referee Tim Robinson.
That was overshadowed by a similar incident in the second half though, when Joe Rodon went in for a header, only for the ball to be pushed out the way by Luke O’Nien’s hand, which was directly above his head.
The Leeds players went ballistic at the referee, but Sunderland were once again let off.
O’Nien didn’t even seem to deny that it had hit his hand, with Sky Sports showing a clip of him shaking his hand in pain straight after the incident.
Luke O’Nien’s ‘hand of God’
There was no denying that the Whites should have had a penalty, and journalist Phil Smith has even gone as far as to compare O’Nien to Diego Maradona for his antics.
Speaking on the Sunderland Echo YouTube channel, Smith said: “I thought they absolutely deserved a draw. They had a massive stroke of luck because obviously Luke O’Nien absolutely Maradona’d it in his own box. He probably fouled it before he handballed it, but Sunderland got away with it.”
Fans of all ages will be familiar with ‘The hand of God’, which was a goal scored by Diego Maradona during the 1986 World Cup quarter-finals between Argentina and England.
The South American put the ball in the back of the net with a glaringly obvious handball and Argentina went onto win the match and the tournament – never to be forgotten by England fans.
Sunderland deserve that ‘stroke of luck’
Of course, Smith is speaking tongue in cheek and Luke O’Nien’s handball wasn’t quite that bad, but it was a pretty shocking decision to turn it down from Tim Robinson.
It was much worse than many penalties you see get given in the Premier League, but thankfully we don’t have VAR in the Championship.
It is, for once, a breath of fresh air though, given how many terrible decisions usually go our way.
The horrific standard of refereeing in the Championship has cost us many points over the past couple of seasons, so it makes a change to be on the other end.
Leeds fans are right to feel hard done by though, especially given their position just a point from the top of the table.
It will be interesting to see what it means for them come the end of the season.