Motherwell seek Ibrox penalty explanation but Jens Berthel Askou keen to move on

Motherwell have sought an explanation over their rejected penalty claim at Ibrox but manager Jens Berthel Askou is keen to move on from the drama.

Referee David Dickinson waved play on when Lukas Fadinger went down under a challenge from Emmanuel Fernandez in the closing moments of their 1-0 defeat by Rangers on Saturday and play quickly continued.

Motherwell’s own footage showed clear contact between Fadinger and the Rangers defender’s outstretched leg but, given official pictures were less conclusive and Dickinson was well placed, there was no VAR review.

Askou was convinced Motherwell should have had a spot-kick and has not changed his opinion, but he left it to chief executive Brian Caldwell to get in touch with the Scottish Football Association referees department.

“I haven’t spoken much to Brian since but I think it’s probably maybe a question of not having the angles that supports what you can clearly see in some of the angles that we have from our photographers,” the Dane said.

“But I can see that the situation, even on the pitch from all sorts of angles wherever you look at it, speaks for itself.

“The communication between them and Brian I think it’s a good, open, fair, honest discussion.

“Eventually maybe they will go out and comment like they do sometimes on some of these things, and I will leave that up to them.

“For us it’s closed, there’s nothing we can do about it. We feel it was a wrong decision and we stand by that, but we have to move on.”

Askou, whose side host Celtic on Tuesday, added: “It doesn’t really make sense to spend a lot of energy on getting all sorts of explanations after the game for me. My most important thing is to make sure that we move on.

“I’m not going to comment any more on that. I think the images and the situation speaks for itself, basically.

“In football and in life, sometimes the things you cannot control, they go your way, sometimes they don’t. You have to accept it and move on. It was a hard one, of course, but we don’t have time to dwell on it.”