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From The Daily Telegraph:
Manchester City have asked for an explanation for the controversial selection of referee Martin Atkinson as a late replacement for Steve Bennett against Manchester United.The West Yorkshire official has been switched from Saturday afternoon's Premier League fixture between Stoke City and Bolton at the Britannia Stadium after Bennett was stranded in Romania as a result of the flight chaos caused by the eruption of the Eyjafjallajökull volcano in Iceland.
Bennett had originally been scheduled to take charge of the game but the Kent official found it impossible to get home from a Fifa-sponsored referees' training camp. While accepting the unforeseen circumstances of Bennett's situation, Atkinson's appointment has been greeted with bemusement at City following the controversy sparked by his officiating during United's 4-3 victory in the corresponding fixture at Old Trafford last September.
Atkinson enraged the then-City manager Mark Hughes by playing six minutes of stoppage time at the end of the game after the fourth official, Alan Wiley, signalled that a minimum of four minutes of added time would be played.
With Michael Owen's winning goal for United timed at 95 minutes and 26 seconds, Hughes was critical of the timekeeping of the officials, saying; "If he [Atkinson] can give me a good reason I wouldn't have a problem, but I just can't see where he got that time." Although Atkinson has taken charge of a City fixture since the derby defeat – the 2-0 home victory against Portsmouth on Jan 31 – senior officials at Eastlands are unhappy at the decision to draft him in for Saturday's derby, having been involved in such controversy during the last league encounter between the two clubs.
After being informed of Atkinson's appointment early on Friday afternoon, City immediately contacted the Professional Game Match Officials Ltd in an effort to seek Riley's observations on the appointment and the reasoning behind the selection of Atkinson. But as of close of business at City, at 6pm on Friday night, the club had not been contacted by Riley or PGMOL to answer their query.
Oh God. This looks like it's true. I really don't want this match to be dominated by an awful officiating decision; Atkinson has a record for buckling under pressure and I'm expecting there to be many, many minutes of Fergie time at the end of the game.
FUCK.
