Wolves knocked out of Carabao Cup after penalties loss to Nottingham Forest

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Wolves knocked out of Carabao Cup after penalties loss to Nottingham Forest

Published: 12 Jan. 2023, 15:50

Wolverhampton Wanderers' Hwang Hee-chan in action with Nottingham Forest's Willy Boly during a Carabao Cup quarterfinal at City Ground in Nottingham on Wednesday. [REUTERS/YONHAP]

Wolverhampton Wanderers were knocked out of the Carabao Cup in the quarterfinals on Wednesday, losing to Nottingham Forest on penalties after a controversial 1-1 draw in extra time.

Willy Boly drew first blood for Forest at City Ground in Nottingham, scoring in the 18th minute to put the home side ahead. Forest continued to control the momentum of the game throughout the first half, with Wolves missing a couple of big opportunities early in the game.

Wolves tied things up shortly after the break with a beautiful play that started with Hwang Hee-chan flicking the ball to Matheus Nunes, who found Matheus Cunha on the right side. Cunha delivered the final cross into the box, which Raúl Jiménez slotted in at the far post.

Hwang played 80 minutes, coming off for Joe Hodge with 10 minutes left of regular time.

The controversy arose minutes before the end of the game, when Nunes was caught on the heel by Emmanuel Dennis inside the box with enough force to send his shoe and shin pad flying.

Somewhat inexplicably, referee Graham Scott waved away the appeals from the Wolves players, and with no VAR in use there was no chance for a review of the play. Had VAR been deployed for the game, the TV replays suggested it probably would have gone to a penalty.

With the score tied after 120 minutes the game went to penalties. Sam Surridge missed the opener for Forest and Ruben Neves for Wolves, but Daniel Podence, Nunes and Cunha all found their mark to tie things up going into the final shot.

Jack Colback scored his penalty to take it to 4-3, with 20-year-old academy player Hodge stepping up to the plate for the biggest kick of the night. Hodge’s effort was saved, knocking Wolves out of the Carabao Cup.

“My reaction is of course negative because we wanted to continue in this competition and I think we fought a lot to get it,” Wolves manager Julen Lopetegui said after the game. “It was a very hard match for both teams.

“We started to suffer one goal from the corner, I don’t remember another chance for them, and then after we had two very big chances in the first-half that we don’t score. In the second-half, we have tried to score, we got one goal, but we had more chances.”

Lopetegui called out what he thinks is the second time an obvious penalty call has gone against Wolves, after a similar incident at Liverpool over the weekend.
“It was a very clear penalty for Matheus Nunes,” he said. “I have seen it and it’s very clear.

“He wants to control the ball and the defender doesn’t allow him to control it. He steps on his foot. It was very clear. But maybe I don’t understand nothing about of the rules of football.

“I have suffered this at Anfield and again today we suffered a lot again. I have to accept it and maybe I need to review all the rules of football. The rules in England are no different to the rules in Spain, France and Germany. It’s all the same.”

BY JIM BULLEY [jim.bulley@joongang.co.kr]