FORGET Gazza's debut, furious Stan Ternent could not believe that his side had been denied a clear penalty 13 minutes into last night's clash with Bradford City at Turf Moor.

"How that's not a penalty I will never know," he fumed. "If that's not a penalty I don't know what is."

"It is ridiculous. My players work hard for nine months and they don't get a bang to rights penalty.

"These are important decisions that can turn the game. It is not an excuse, it is just a fact"

The object of his fury was Staffordshire official Tony Bates who did not see the foul on David Johnson as he was about to convert a low cross from Ian Moore in the 13th minute.

"You get in trouble if you criticise referees but he was bang out of order. He is responsible to those players out there," he said.

"How can 20 odd thousand people see it and he didn't, it is ridiculous."

Johnson himself had no doubts he had been fouled and was just as baffled by the referees decision.

"It was a great ball in from Mooro and someone caught my legs as I was going to knock it in," he admitted. "I thought the ref was too far away but I'm still surprised the linesman didn't give it."

But despite his anger Ternent refused to be down beat after dropping more points at home as his side climbed to third in the table with just six games to go.

"It has been a good few days work because we have taken seven points out of nine and I am pretty happy with that because we didn't play as well as we can," he said.

"We have got six games to go and are in a really good position. We have got a lot of players out but we will definitely be there or thereabouts."

There will be concern about Glen Little who came off in the second half suffering from "flu or something" according to his manager who said he was shaking.

But Ternent is confident that both Paul Gascoigne and David Johnson will have benefited from playing most of the game and come back fitter and stronger to face Sheffield United on Saturday.