McGregor upset by decisions

McGregor upset by decisions

Published Oct. 15, 2012 7:15 a.m. ET

Allan McGregor believes Scotland were once again the victims of poor decisions by the match officials in their 2-1 defeat to Wales on Friday.

Craig Levein's men were on course for a first win of their World Cup qualifying campaign in Cardiff when James Morrison fired them into a first half lead.

Steven Fletcher then had what appeared to be a perfectly good goal disallowed, before the home side hit back to snatch the points through a late Gareth Bale double, which included a debatable penalty.

Scotland's hopes of reaching the Euro 2012 play-offs were shattered following a dubious penalty decision in favour of the Czech Republic, while Macedonia claimed a point at Hampden last month thanks to what appeared to be an offside goal.

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And McGregor is unhappy that questionable decisions have cost the Scots once again in Wales.

He told the Scottish Football Association website: "I don't think we deserved that result, I really don't. I have said it already and I will say it again: some of the decisions we have had to contend with are really hard to take and it was the same again on Friday night.

"I am not taking anything away from Wales and I know it sounds like sour grapes but it is true and you only have to look at some of the incidents.

"If you look back to the penalty against the Czech Republic at Hampden - that cost us a place at the play-offs.

"It happened against Macedonia when their goalscorer [Nikolche Noveski] was offside and again on Friday night, when a perfectly good goal was chalked off."

Charlie Adam's cross was deemed to have swerved out of play before reaching Fletcher, despite television footage appearing to show otherwise.

McGregor added: "From where I was, I saw the flag go up early so assumed it was offside.

"Then the referee gestured that the cross had gone over the byline.

"We couldn't believe it when we saw the incident afterwards and saw that the ball was well in play and that Steven's header was absolutely fine.

"It makes it that much harder to accept because at 2-0 down the game is over - no doubt about it.

"We were playing well and creating chances and the second goal would have killed Wales off.

"Instead, they get a soft penalty and arguably they should have been down to 10 men in the last 10 minutes."

The defeat leaves Scotland second bottom of Group A and needing a win against favourites Belgium in Brussels on Tuesday to have any hope of salvaging their ailing campaign.

The Besiktas goalkeeper said: "It is always important to bounce back when you don't get a good result and it is especially so now.

"Obviously qualifying has become more difficult now but we can't give up and we need to look forward to the Belgium game with belief that we can take something from them.

"It's hard to pinpoint what is going wrong.

"As the manager said, there is just one ingredient away from things going well but luck is definitely not something we have had a lot of.

"The group was always going to be a difficult one and it has become even more difficult now but we have to take the positives, block out the negatives and do our best to get a result in Belgium."

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