Burnley manager Sean Dyche has leapt to the defence of Ashley Barnes over his tackle on Nemanja Matic in Saturday's 1-1 draw at Chelsea.
Matic was red-carded on 70 minutes for violently pushing Barnes to the ground in response to what Blues boss Jose Mourinho said was a 'career threatening' challenge from the Clarets striker.
The 25-year-old has since escaped retrospective punishment for the incident, a decision which has the backing of Dyche.
"This is my initial impression, Ashley Barnes tries to play the ball down to Dave Jones, who is behind him, his momentum and pendulum motion of his leg swings through the ball and unfortunately Matic is late arriving on the scene, and his leg pendulums through and hits him on the shin," he told the club's official YouTube channel.
"I need to make this clear, please, everyone, look at the reaction from a bunch of expert footballers on the Chelsea side. The likes of John Terry, a real warrior and a top class professional in my opinion, [Kurt] Zouma, big, strong boys, [Branislav] Ivanovic right on top of this moment. Mourinho, [has] a similar view to me, the crowd behind me circa 15,000 - no one reacts. Live time, no one reacts apart from Matic.
"Now, my point to this is at live time, remember the referee has a chance at live time, no one reacts. In fact, if you look at the footage, the camera pans to Mourinho and his assistant and they are calmly talking about what they should do."
The Burnley boss later added: "Now after the event, with hindsight, with camera views and slo-mo, statements like "criminal" are being used, I find that hard to adjust to when live at that moment, 15,000 behind me, their expert staff, including a high-quality manager, and most of all the players on the football pitch, I've been in football all my life, when moments like that occur, it's very rare that there's not a reaction within the stadium to that moment, live time. I need to exaggerate that point because it's important.
"On slow motion, of course it looks ugly but there was contact with the ball [from Barnes]. I would suggest once you are in that pendulum motion to play a pass it is very difficult to then retract your leg immediately and stop your leg from going through that ball and rising.
"But I must make it clear that, when you see it in slow mo, it does not look pleasant."
Chelsea have sought to have Matic's red card rescinded after reportedly lodging an appeal on Monday.
Shane Callaghan
