Philippe Clement accuses Ipswich Town player of cheating v Norwich City | OneFootball

Philippe Clement was not happy wit Ipswich Town's Jack Taylor for the way he won the penalty in their 2-0 victory over Norwich City.

Norwich City suffered a second defeat to Ipswich Town this season as they were beaten 2-0 by their bitter rivals at Carrow Road in what was a controversial game.

Jaden Philogene gave the Tractor Boys the lead from the spot after Jack Taylor was adjudged to have been fouled by Anis Ben Slimane, whilst an excellent George Hirst strike doubled their advantage just before the break.

Kieran McKenna’s side looked comfortable in the second half, although Marcelino Nunez was very fortunate to avoid a second yellow card after committing two fouls on a caution, with Ipswich subbing the Chile international just 23 minutes after he had come on.

Philippe Clement criticised Ipswich Town’s Jack Taylor for ‘trying to cheat’

So, there was plenty of fallout to the game, and the penalty was understandably a talking point, as it gave Ipswich the chance to take the lead.

The contact from Slimane on Taylor did appear to be minimal, with the Ireland international seemingly on his way down after he nicked the ball.

It’s fair to say Clement wasn’t pleased with the decision, as he told reporter Justin Allen it’s why he is in favour of VAR, as he also had some harsh words for Taylor.

“That was good stuff in that first 10 minutes, but then you get a penalty against us that is totally not a penalty, for me.

“Anis wants to clear the ball, the other player sees that moment a little bit faster than him, a split second, and then he dives into Anis and Anis doesn’t touch his leg like he’s pretending has been done.

“We make a transition in that moment and four or five seconds later there’s a decision made to give a penalty against us. That’s a game-decisive moment and it’s a hard one.

“Because of that, as I’ve said all these weeks, I’m a fan of VAR to avoid these moments because this was never a penalty with VAR, never. This is a player trying to cheat, (acting) like he’s been caught by a tackle, has gone down, which was not the case and he wins in this situation.

“More players will try to do those things if you don’t have an objective view on things. I know the referee can’t be in the right position all the time to see everything, it’s impossible. That’s why they need objective help in these situations because in football, too many games are decided by one or two moments, one or two goals, so these decisions need to be right.”

Ipswich Town made the most of the decisions that went their way in Norwich City win

The first goal is always huge in any game, and you can understand why Clement and Norwich feel aggrieved at Anthony Backhouse’s decision to give a penalty.

You don’t often hear a manager explicitly say a player tried to cheat, so it may not go down well with some, but the reality is that Taylor was playing for that penalty, and there certainly wasn’t enough contact to make him go down in the way he did.

Ipswich will rightly point out that it happens week in, week out, across the country, but it’s something that should be called out.

Backhouse’s failure to not send Nunez off was also very surprising, so it was a poor afternoon for the official, and whilst Ipswich were very impressive in their overall display, it would’ve been interesting to see how the game played out if different calls had been made.

When you consider the goal Birmingham had wrongly disallowed at Portman Road last week, Ipswich are getting the rub of the green right now, but McKenna’s men still deserve credit for the way they have made the most of it.

That felt like a statement win for Ipswich, and with Millwall and Middlesbrough both dropping points, they have put themselves in a fantastic position to seal an automatic return to the Premier League.