Southampton manager Gordon Strachan branded his side's defeat at Manchester United "a farce" before launching an attack on referee Graham Barber. Strachan was adamant Ruud van Nistelrooy was offside before he netted United's winner, and scathing about a string of decisions he felt had cost his side a point.
The Saints boss was angry at Barber's application of new offside laws and said: "It was a farce.
"Van Nistelrooy was interfering with play. As soon as the ball was touched he was going towards the ball.
"He was there to try and get one up on us.
"You might as well scrap offside now if you are not going to rule that offside.
 |  I might as well have gone to the referee and asked him whether we should make the journey or just give them the points and have a game of golf |
"I don't care about clauses ABC and D, all they do is cover the backsides of inadequate people.
"What is to stop a team from shoving four players round a goalkeeper at any time and preventing him from moving?
"I haven't bothered going to see the referee - no doubt he'll pop up on a phone-in somewhere.
"He was on television this morning - why can't he just concentrate on refereeing instead of being a celebrity?
"I get annoyed because we spent Friday working hard on how we were going to defend set pieces.
"I might as well have gone to the referee instead and asked him whether we should make the journey or just give them the points and have a game of golf instead."
Strachan admitted that the free-kick from which United scored the winner should have been a penalty for handball against Fabrice Fernandes.
"That's not the point, we might as well go back to the kick-off if we are going to pick up on every mistake," raged the Saints boss.
MMIX
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