Saturday 28 November 2015 21:40, UK
Everton manager Roberto Martinez questioned why eight minutes of injury-time was played in his side's 3-3 draw with Bournemouth on Saturday.
The fourth official indicated there would be a minimum of five minutes to be added on at the end of the second half at the Vitality Stadium, with Ross Barkley then putting the visitors 3-2 in front in the 95th minute of the game.
However, after Martinez then replaced Arouna Kone with Darron Gibson in the 97th minute of the contest, Bournemouth equalised straight from the restart to earn themselves a point.
The Spaniard, though, felt the match should have not have gone on that long, despite the fact the final whistle was also further delayed after Everton's fans invaded the pitch in the immediate aftermath of Barkley's strike.
"It is very disappointing to get in a position where we give away a two-goal lead," he said. "But then it was a terrific reaction, the personality we showed to get the third goal, it was a real example of how you respond to disappointment.
"From that point on, it is out of our hands, a period that is longer than should have been played, a quick hopeful ball into the box which ends up with the ball in the back of the net. Things that sometimes you cannot really control and it feels devastating when you give that lead away, which I felt over the course of the 90 minutes we should know how to win the football game.
"Obviously there was a substitution and we get an extra body to get into position and defend with good experience and focus and from that point on it just seems that the play is allowed to go a little bit longer than it should have.
"I do not understand the reason, I would like to find that out, and at that point it was just a hope from the home side to try and get the ball into the box and sometimes those can go away from your control.
"But clearly it was too long of a period in terms of explanation as to why we played such a long time at the end of the game. It is not something that you are going to get out of the referees and from our point of view, you want to win the game by controlling your own destiny."
Martinez did feel his players allowed Bournemouth back into the game after half-time, which they went in two goals ahead after strikes from Ramiro Funes Mori and Romelu Lukaku.
"In football, you need to make sure that you start well, especially when you go away from home, and we did that," he said.
"And I thought that everything we were focussed on doing we did that in our first-half display. We got the goal, I thought we defended really well and obviously in games you will have to get through periods where the home side is going to put a lot of pressure on you.
"But I do not think that in the second half we controlled that period well enough. I thought we could have taken advantage better of the fact Bournemouth were throwing a lot of attacking players higher up the pitch, we could have done a little bit better there.
"I think we did that in the first half, but we probably should have put the game to bed in that period in the second half, but to find a way to score that third goal was really important in the way we could get over that disappointment. To get the second equaliser is hard to take and it is difficult to give it a justification."
The Everton boss was also critical of his team for not killing the game off quicker by scoring a third goal earlier on in the second half.
"It is natural as the home side that you are going to throw a lot of attacking players forward and I think in those moments you need to control the game better," he added. "We got in situations with two versus two's, and even in good options to kill the game and at that point we are a better team than those moments and we could have done a bit better.
"But it is not about that as you get the 2-2 equaliser from Bournemouth and then we find a way to score another goal, and at that moment the game should have been over. But maybe sometimes in those situations you need a little bit of luck.
"And maybe Bournemouth had not had that little bit of luck throughout the season, and today they got it, but from our point of view, as you can imagine, it is devastating and really frustrating to lose two points in the manner that they got away today."
