We need change of luck - Souey

A FRUSTRATED Graeme Souness was left to rue another controversial refereeing decision as Blackburn Rovers saw more precious points slip away in the dying seconds of Saturday's game with Manchester United.

Rovers were leading 1-0 until the fourth minute of injury time but then Paul Scholes floated a free kick into the penalty area and the ball clearly struck Louis Saha on the arm before Alan Smith lashed a cruel equaliser past a helpless Brad Friedel.

It was the second time in a week that Rovers had conceded a dubious goal in stoppage time, following on from last week's agonising 3-2 defeat at Southampton.

And this time Souness was angry on two counts, claiming the referee Alan Wiley should never have played four minutes of over-time in the first place, never mind the fact that none of the officials had managed to spot Saha's handball in the build-up to the equalising goal.

"I think you've got to say it would have been hard on Manchester United if they'd gone away with nothing but when you concede a goal like that in the last few seconds of the game it hurts," said the Rovers boss.

"As the television clearly shows, it was a handball by Louis Saha but right now we're just not getting the rub of the green.

" We've had two quarter to one kick-offs in the last seven days and the last minute of each game has cost us dearly.

"Hopefully, luck will even itself between now and next May but I did say that several times last season and it didn't."

Souness was said to be 'boiling' at the way United got their equaliser and the inference from the Rovers camp after the game was that the referee had signalled there was to be three minutes of stoppage time but Sir Alex Ferguson then intervened and the fourth official suddenly changed it to four.

When pressed on that point afterwards, Souness wisely decided to keep his own counsel but you could hear the sense of frustration in his voice.

"There's a couple of things I'd love to go into but I can't because if I do it only works against you," said Souness.

"All I will say is I'm delighted with a point given that we had one point before today and we were playing against a top team. They had us on the back foot for most of the game but we showed resilience and defended well and Brad (Friedel) had an excellent game.

"At the end of the day, we are not Manchester United, we are a small club in East Lancashire and I thought we worked our socks off to stay with one of the best teams in the world and we were seconds away from winning it."

Souness also felt aggrieved by Mr Wiley's decision to send off Lorenzo Amoruso for a second bookable offence with 20 minutes remaining after claiming the first yellow card for a foul on Klebersen should never have been issued.

"I saw the first one because that happened right in front of us," added the Rovers boss. "My reading of that is there might have been contact but before there was contact, the ball had been kicked out of play.

"But, hey, I'm not a referee!"