Referees' chief Keith Hackett has said sorry to Neil Warnock after Crystal Palace were denied a valid goal in Saturday's 1-0 defeat at Bristol City.

Freddie Sears fired home on 30 minutes but referee Rob Shoebridge failed to spot that the ball had crossed the line before bouncing out off a stanchion. After the match, Warnock claimed his side had been "cheated". And Hackett admitted: "You would like to think the match officials would have spotted the ball had crossed the line."

As well as saying sorry to Warnock, Hackett also offered his apologies to the Palace fans who had travelled to Bristol. "They are passionate and I apologise they travelled all that way to see a goal ruled out by an error from the match officials," he said.

Hackett, the general manager of the Professional Game Match Officials Board, also confirmed that Shoebridge has been dropped from officiating Tuesday's Championship match between Plymouth and Cardiff as a result of his error. "He was scheduled to do a game in midweek. He won't be doing that. We have been working on that this morning. The ref has been spoken to," said Hackett. "It applies to the referee's assistant as well. Ideally you want the assistant looking from one angle and the ref from another. Therefore between them you want the decision to be right."

As well as being angry with Shoebridge, Warnock insisted that Bristol City boss Gary Johnson and his players "could have shown more sportsmanship because they knew it was a goal". And the Palace boss was unrepentant about his post-match comments when he spoke again on Sunday, insisting he felt City were morally obliged to have allowed his side to score a goal after Shoebridge's blunder. "Nothing has changed," said Warnock. "I feel really hurt and almost cheated out of a result. I felt sorry for the lads after all the work and preparation they put in. "We've already got a transfer embargo upon us and we lost Stern John last week in the first game, a striker, so to score goals is hard enough as it is. "The body language of the Bristol players and the fans should have told the referee it was a goal. If it had been at the other end of the pitch, there would have been a riot. "Refs make mistakes but morally I felt Bristol should have let us score a goal there."
Johnson was quick to hit back at Warnock, though. "Cheating is not a very nice word to use especially when we had nothing to do with it except for being the opposition on this occasion," said the City boss. "We knew the ball had gone into the net, but we got word the ref said there was an infringement so there is nothing more we can do. "It happened to us twice last year and it is very disappointing and you have a little moan and you get on with it. I can understand Neil being disappointed but you have to choose your words these days.
"But nobody has cheated, nobody means to make mistakes and we had a perfectly good goal on the day ruled out for offside.
"That happens. It will happen to us many times and to Palace many times and you are aggrieved and you have got to get on with it."

Warnock, whose side were eventually beaten by an 89th-minute goal from Nicky Maynard, believes that officials need to be given help if they fail to spot such incidents.

"Refs need help if they can't see that is a goal," he said. "If they can't spot these injustices they have got to have help."