‘Penalty to United’ – Liverpool fans react to referee chosen for Man Utd game

Liverpool fans are reacting to the news that Martin Atkinson will referee the Premier League game against Manchester United this weekend.

It’s a huge game. The two biggest clubs in the Premier League are facing off this weekend as Liverpool Football Club head to Manchester United. That means there is a lot of interest in who will be the referee for such an important clash.

Liverpool are top of the league with a perfect eight wins from eight games to gain an eight point  lead over Manchester City early in the season. A win for Liverpool against their fiercest rivals away from home would be a huge step towards the title.

Man Utd will not be challenging this season. They have just nine points from their eight fixtures and there is huge pressure on manager Ole Gunnar Solskjaer. An embarrassing loss to the Reds could see him shown the exit door.

For the tie the Premier League has selected Martin Atkinson as the referee causing ire from both fanbases.

Liverpool fans were not impressed:

Many Liverpool fans believe Atkinson is not sympathetic to Jurgen Klopp or his side. However there are plenty of United fans pointing to stats that suggest they should be the ones complaining about the referee choice:

The Liverpool ECHO confirm some of our rivals’ suspicions by looking at the Reds record with Atkinson on the whistle:

“The Reds are unbeaten in the last 13 games in which the Dewsbury-born referee has whistled – including last December’s 3-1 win over United at Anfield – a run stretching back to the 1-0 League Cup semi-final second leg defeat to Southampton in January 2017.

And you have to go back until March 2015 for the last time Atkinson oversaw a Liverpool defeat in the Premier League.”

The game is on Sunday 20th October at 4:30pm BST/11:30am EST. We will have all the build up this week including information about how to watch the game for free online.