“Absolutely unacceptable”: Refereeing chief claims United loanee very fortunate to avoid red last weekend

Manchester United’s Rasmus Hojlund has had a roller coaster of a time in Italy. Napoli loan After a largely ineffective two years at Old Trafford, Hojlund was sent on loan to Napoli in Serie A. His move originally started with great success, scoring on his debut versus Fiorentina. He has bagged a total of two goals in seven league matches for the champions. What’s more, he has also scored two goals in three Champions League matches. Nonetheless, the goals for the Dane and Napoli have dried up in recent times. Hojlund has not found the back of the net since the 5th October for Napoli against Genoa. The team itself has only scored one goal since that time. Lucky escape The Dane also not only put in a weak performance in the 2-0 defeat to Bologna at the weekend but he was also lucky to stay on the pitch. Football Italia report that refereeing designator Gianluca Rocchi confirmed that Rasmus Hojlund “should’ve been sent off” for his reaction to a foul during the game. As the two fell to the ground, Hojlund was seen throwing an elbow at Lewis Ferguson’s ribs in retaliation. The action was actually spotted by the referee and the Dane was shown a yellow card as punishment. Rocchi believes that the United striker was fortunate and stated, “for us, this is a sending off, because the attitude is absolutely unacceptable.” He continued, “it is true that Ferguson is holding him, but the correct decision would’ve been to send off Hojlund and book Ferguson. In this case, you don’t even need to evaluate the intensity of the strike, because a player should not have this type of attitude.” Rocchi also spoke on the importance of eradicating serious foul play and that it is the referee’s job to protect players from it. Rasmus Hojlund 25/26 stats PlayerAppearancesGoalsAssistsMinutes Rasmus Hojlund1040764 Source: transfermarkt.com Featured image Maurizio Lagana via Getty Images – The Peoples Person has been one of the world’s leading Man United news sites for over a decade. Follow us on Bluesky: @peoplesperson.bsky.social Alex Browne Alex is a huge Manchester United fan, inspired by greats of his homeland such as George Best, Harry Gregg and Norman Whiteside. Alex has a Master’s degree from Queen’s University Belfast and La Universitat Rovira i Virgili in Tarragona, Spain. Having lived in the country since 2011, Alex is The Peoples Person’s Spanish football expert and is fluent in both Spanish and Catalan. He dreams of witnessing a United captain triumphantly hoisting the Premier League and Champions League trophy in the air once more.