City boss Mancini was fuming with Clattenburg's decision to wave away his side's penalty appeal while they were leading 1-0 and completely dominating at a wet and windy Stamford Bridge. Clattenburg rubbed salt into the wound by sending off Gael Clichy as well as awarding Chelsea a late spot-kick as Mancini's men lost 2-1 and gave hope to all of their title rivals. Asked about Clattenburg's performance, Mancini said sarcastically: "I agree with all of his decisions." The official appeared to have a good view of City's first-half penalty claim, when David Silva went over after Jose Bosingwa dangled his leg in the box. Asked why Clattenburg might not have seen the incident, Mancini said: "It was raining a lot." He added: "We did a good performance in the first half. We played very, very well, deserved to score two or three goals. "There was a big penalty. There wasn't a fan outside the stadium who didn't see it. "But the referee was very close and didn't see it. "When one team plays very well and has a chance to score another goal there is a big penalty, you should concede. "When you play against Chelsea, you can lose, because Chelsea's a good team - but not like this." Opposite number Andre Villas-Boas admitted his side had been fortunate, saying of Mancini: "It's unlucky for him. "We've been having our decisions that have not been going our way and today it maybe didn't go Man City's way. "But that's the nature of the game and at least our penalty's a blatant penalty." Mancini said he had not spoken to Clattenburg, who booked Clichy twice in 11 minutes to hand Chelsea the initiative. "After the sending-off, the game totally changed," said Mancini, who admitted there had been a heated exchange in the tunnel between opposing players after the game. "I don't know if (Ashley) Cole said something. "I don't know what he said. I don't understand." But Villas-Boas said: "It's untrue and it's unfair. It really doesn't matter now. "There's always some trouble-making situation in our wins to divert the story, so whatever." Mancini insisted a first defeat of the season would not derail his side's title bid. "It doesn't change anything for us, because we knew before we should lose one game," he said. "We lost today but the season is very, very long, it's very hard. "We didn't deserve to lose this game but we lost. "Now it's finished and after tomorrow, we should prepare for the next game, which will be difficult because we meet Arsenal." The result also brought Chelsea right back into the title race. Villas-Boas was delighted with his side's character after they bounced back from behind to a Mario Balotelli goal inside two minutes, with Raul Meireles equalising before substitute Frank Lampard netted from the spot. Villas-Boas said: "We did very, very well in the second half to find that detail that would take us through to the three points. "So, [I'm] very, very happy. It's a very, very gratifying win. It's been a good week for us. "It changes a little bit our challenge for the Premier League. "Seven points in this Premier League at the moment, with so many teams competing for the title, it's nothing. "Man City play Arsenal in the next week, we play Tottenham. "For our title challenge to continue to be alive, we will have to continue to be competent through the December fixtures, and then we can take a look at it in January to see more or less where we are and see if things are back on track again." Villas-Boas has developed something of a siege mentality at Stamford Bridge in recent weeks, lashing out at his critics more than once. He said tonight: "You can check them on the internet, you can Google it and come across it. It was criticism to us, criticism to me, criticism to our players. "'Our players are not fit, these players cannot compete for this title, they cannot compete with this philosophy'. "So the fact that we won away to Newcastle, we won against Valencia to be top of the [Champions League] group, and we won against the unbeaten league leaders showed that in fact these guys can take it through. "We are competent, we believe in our title hopes, we believe in our title challenge."
