‘He could have avoided it’ – Ten Hag blame Joshua Zirkzee after Alejandro Garnacho’s goal against Brighton ruled out for Man Utd’s rookie offside knee

The Manchester United winger thought he had tapped in an easy finish to put the Red Devils in front against Brighton with 20 minutes to go at the Amex.

Alejandro Garnacho thought he had put Man Utd in front at Brighton

The goal was ruled out because Joshua Zirkzee was offside

However, the ball ricocheted off Zirkzee’s knee ON the line – with the striker having already slid in and missing the initial pass across by Bruno Fernandes.

And so even though the ball was clearly going in, the goal was chalked off in bizarre fashion because the summer signing was ahead of Garnacho at the time of the shot.

Had Zirkzee made contact with the ball once the ball had fully crossed the line, the goal would have stood.

But the Dutchman could do nothing to prevent the inadvertent intervention.

Zirkzee – who scored the winner on his debut against Fulham last week – reacted immediately as if he knew he had messed up the Garnacho goal.

So when the Argentine wheeled away in celebration, his United team-mate got to his feet and stood perplexed and dejected inside the goal.

Man United manager Erik ten Hag has shared his thoughts on the disallowed goal in their 2-1 defeat to Brighton, highlighting Joshua Zirkzee’s role in the incident.

Ten Hag acknowledged the difficulty of the situation but suggested that Zirkzee could have avoided being offside if he had read the play better.

“If he had read the situation better, maybe he could have avoided it,” the Dutch manager explained.

However, Ten Hag also sympathised with Zirkzee, noting that once he had committed to sliding for the ball, he couldn’t avoid being offside.

“You can do nothing once you are on the slide, you can’t avoid the ball,” he added.

And fans quickly flooded social media with reaction.

One said: “You can’t blame Joshua Zirkzee there. Every striker would stick his leg out there, it’s intuition. He just got unlucky.”

Another wrote: “Such a shame for Garnacho. Can’t fault Zirkzee for his reaction.”

A third joked: “Justice for Coventry,” in reference to the controversial FA Cup semi-final finale as United survived thanks to a toe-nail VAR offside call.

Garnacho thought he had done enough before the inadvertent intervention

The Argentine initially wheeled away in celebration

But he was ultimately left disappointed when VAR intervened

But a fair few want the offside rules to be changed because Zirkzee’s accidental mishap had no advantage for the attacking team.

One explained: “It’s the right decision but just feel common sense should be applied here. There’s no impact on the outcome, the ball was going in the net, there’s no defence, no goalkeeper unsighted. The destination had not changed.”

A second typed: “That’s actually pretty stupid the rule should be changed to allow that as a goal especially as no player had a chance of stopping.”

And it proved a costly touch from Zirkzee.

The incident happened at 1-1, with Amad Diallo’s deflected strike cancelling out ex-United man Danny Welbeck’s opener.

But in the fifth minute of injury time, Joao Pedro was given acres of space at the back post to head in a dramatic winner to snatch all three points.

Zirkzee was spotted talking to Ten Hag as they walked off the pitch after full-time, seemingly explaining what happened.

The Dutchman was clearly offside after his initial slide

The decision was confirmed on the big screens