Michael Carrick: Lisandro Martinez hair-pull red card ‘one of worst I’ve ever seen’

Michael Carrick slammed the decision to send Manchester United defender Lisandro Martinez off for pulling Dominic Calvert-Lewin’s hair as “shocking” and “one of the worst” he had ever seen. The Argentina defender was shown a straight red card by referee Paul Tierney in his side’s 2-1 defeat following a VAR review. But Carrick argued that while Martinez touched the Leeds striker’s hair, it was not aggressive and should not constitute violent conduct.

And the usually mild-manner Carrick, who had been aggrieved at the officiating in the 2-2 draw at Bournemouth , was outspoken in his criticisms. Lisandro Martinez was sent off for pulling Dominic Calvert-Lewin’s hair (Reuters) He said: "I thought the boys stayed positive and fought for everything in the second half, after a shocking decision to send Licha [Martinez] off. That's two games in a row we've had those decisions go against us, but that one was one of the worst I've seen.

“The red card, that is really concerning if that's going to be a sending off. I know he's touched his hair. He can't deny he touched his head.

There's a difference between touching somebody the way he has and brushed his hair to actually, really aggressively, tugging on it, so the arm in the face of Lisandro to start with, so he's kind of off balance in the kind of off grappling. “He almost just goes to touch him and grab his shirt and he ends up catching his head, touches the back of his hair, the bobble comes out and you can you get a red card. It's not aggressive.