LONDON -- Tottenham Hotspur manager Martin Ho said that refereeing in the Women's Super League (WSL) "has got worse" following a contentious penalty awarded in Arsenal's favour.
The Gunners snatched a 2-1 win following a handball call on Ella Morris despite the ball hitting her hand via her teammate.
According to the IFAB rules "if a player is hit on the hand/arm by the ball from a teammate's kick/header? This is not a handball."
Ho said there was a similar incident in Arsenal's box that was not given and questioned the interpretation of the rules that led to his side's defeat.
"There was one earlier in the game that hits Lisa Baum's hand, it's the same distance and that happens in the box. They can't give me an explanation. I think it's got worse, the refereeing has got worse than it was last year," he told a news conference.
"My interpretation of the rule is if your teammate hits it and your teammate is one yard away, time and distance is taken into account and it's not a penalty. That's my understanding of it. That's what we were told at the start of the season in the referee meeting."
Ho spoke to the officiating team who he said could not answer his question and added that he intends to speak to them after the news conference to try and get clarity on the decision.
"I want to understand what they're seeing because then I can accept a decision that is there. When that decides a game it's frustrating because it's not within the law of the game.
"They have a hard enough job, I get it, but in games like this, when it's decided on things like that and I thought the inconsistency throughout the game was the same. We just have to dust ourselves down. But it's frustrating it's decided on a decision like that when the rule is in black and white and we get told that at the start of the season."
The WSL does not use VAR or goal-line technology and not all officials are full-time.
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Chelsea manager Sonia Bompastor called for more respect from referees after poor officiating in the Champions League quarterfinal against Arsenal last season, while former managers Emma Hayes and Jonas Eidevall lamented refereeing during their tenures, indicating little change in the standard of officiating.
When asked how he would improve the refereeing, Ho said: "They need more support and more full-time [referees]. I understand there is probably a rule where they can't do more than one game on a weekend and that's nothing against any of the referees but they've got an elite referee on the side the pitch, for a big game, put them in the middle."
Ho was referring to former FIFA referee Lisa Benn who was fourth official on Saturday while Phoebe Cross was the referee.
"I think that's where they need more support, more training because when you look at most decisions that are going on, there's a lot of controversy in a lot of games. We get two bookings in the first half but we have players being dragged back by the shirt by Arsenal players and we don't get nothing. That's probably the frustrating part."