Dan Walker mocks Fabian Balbuena red card decision in West Ham v Chelsea

Dan Walker has mocked Chris Kavanagh’s decision to award Fabian Balbuena a red card as West Ham lost 1-0 to Chelsea at the London Stadium.

The VAR asked Kavanagh to take another look at Balbuena’s challenge on Blues defender Ben Chilwell and the referee sent the Paraguyuan off after reviewing it on the pitchside monitor.

It was a decision that drew derision online and many took the opportunity to fume, but BBC broadcaster Walker tried to make some light of Saturday night’s incident.

West Ham

He wrote on his personal Twitter profile, “Go on…make it a red” accompanied by a photo of famous TV personalities Ant and Dec, who are notorious for their hidden camera sketch where they secretly instruct people to do things that are unknown to those around them.

Premier League jesters

Walker might be able to poke fun at it but it’s a decision that ultimately cost us any chance of attaining a positive result against our London rivals.

That’s not to say we would definitely have levelled Timo Werner’s goal that ultimately proved to be the winner, but there were some encouraging signs that we could force our way into the game and nick something at the end.

The red card obliterated that possibility.

We’re a club that often has people trying to poke fun at us, and it’s often brought on those up above with GSB particularly culpable for some embarrassing shenanigans.

But this was a shameful error on the part of the referee and there’s no laughter from us at this, it’s a decision that could cost us Champions League football, and maybe even a shot at the Europa League.

That’s how tight the margins are in the Premier League, we’re just crossing everything that this won’t derail our end to the season.

In other West Ham news, Trevor Sinclair shares what he’s heard about Tammy Abraham amid Irons transfer speculation.

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