Referee needed to 'be stronger' - O'Neill

Northern Ireland were beaten 1-0 by Slovakia in Kosice

Northern Ireland manager Michael O'Neill said the yellow card he was shown at the end of his side's 1-0 defeat by Slovakia was for telling the referee to "be stronger".

Striker Tomas Bobcek netted in additional time to win the 2026 World Cup qualifier for his side after the hosts in Kosice had two earlier efforts disallowed in the half.

Northern Ireland felt that the substitute's strike which ended their hopes of a top-two spot in Group A should also have been chalked off by referee Istvan Kovacs for a push by Leo Sauer on Daniel Ballard in the build-up.

To compound O'Neill's frustration, Ballard was later sent off after picking up a yellow card the manager described as "a joke," while he added he felt it was "disappointing" that his opposing boss Francesco Calzona did not shake hands after the game.

"I said to the referee that he needed to be stronger and he booked me," said O'Neill.

"I went to shake his hand, said that he needed to be stronger, and that was enough for him to book me. If I'm not allowed to say that, then I shouldn't have said it."

Despite the loss, Northern Ireland will still take part in March play-offs to make it to next year's World Cup thanks to winning their Nations League group in November.

The loss in the penultimate fixture in the campaign does still damage their hopes of making it to North America, however, as they will enter those play-offs in the lowest group of seeds.

Slovakia originally thought they had taken the lead in the 56th minute when Lukas Haraslin's free-kick flew past Bailey Peacock-Farrell, but it was adjudged that Milan Skriniar had obstructed the view of the Northern Ireland goalkeeper.

Just eight minutes later, they had another strike disallowed by VAR after David Strelec was penalised for handling the ball when finishing from another Haraslin set-piece.

O'Neill felt that the decisions to rule out the previous efforts played into allowing the late winner.

"It was a clear push on Daniel Ballard at the corner, two hands in his back," said O'Neill.

"The other goals that were disallowed should have been disallowed. The first one was offside, the lines show that clearly, and the second one was handball.

"You have to look at each incident on its own merit, you can't go cumulative and referee the last incident differently to how you refereed the other two incidents."

Following the winning goal, Ballard was sent off for a second yellow card offence and midfielder George Saville was booked with both players now ruled out of Monday night's game with Luxembourg through suspension.

On Ballard's second yellow, O'Neill said: "The Slovakian dug-out that caused that as much as anything."

"The [second] yellow card for Daniel is a joke," he continued.

"If you look at it back, it is poor. He is a top referee, he has refereed the Champions League final, he should have disallowed the goal."

The victory, which keeps alive Slovakia's hopes of qualifying automatically for next summer's tournament, sparked huge celebrations from the hosts with O'Neill describing their reaction as "disappointing".

"Everything was on the line for Slovakia. You could tell that by the way their technical area behaved towards the end of the game, which was disappointing.

"Disappointing for their coach not to shake my hand.

"Ultimately, we congratulate Slovakia because they can go to Germany and try to win the group."