Chelsea manager Jose Mourinho has fumed that opposition are being given “Christmas gifts” by referees after his team were beaten 5-3 by Tottenham on Thursday.
The former Real Madrid boss appeared to be angry with a number of Dowd’s decsions while on the touchline as he berated the fourth official with regularity.
Mourinho claimed on Sunday that there is a campaign among referees to punish his side, but refused to be drawn on the issue after seeing his side suffer just their second league loss of the season.
“I don’t want to be punished. I want to be here in the next match. So I will just say that we lost. Today is another day, Sunday is another match, life goes on,” he told BT Sport.
“Campaign? I don’t want to answer that. I think we made some defensive mistakes, some individual mistakes, it was not easy for my defenders to cope with a good [Nacer] Chadli and especially a good [Harry] Kane, but it was also difficult for Tottenham to cope with an amazing [Eden] Hazard and good Diego Costa.
“You can focus on the result, on the important moments of the game, I prefer the former because I can’t talk about the big moments. You don’t want to talk about the decisions? I don’t.
“I hate to lose. But I prefer to lose like I did against Newcastle – with a clean performance from the official.
“A game of football that you lose is a different feeling. We had important Christmas gifts in the last two matches – gifts that people who love football don’t like.”
