Wrexham manager Phil Parkinson was left fuming after his side’s pre-season clash with Manchester United.
A clash it was, too, as tempers ran high during the match in San Diego in the early hours of Wednesday morning.
Erik ten Hag had deployed a youthful line-up as the Red Devils take on Real Madrid on Thursday, so he opted to save his senior figures for the highly-anticipated outing.
United sustained a 3-1 defeat to the League Two outfit but it wasn’t the scoreline that made the headlines today.
Nathan Bishop collided with Wrexham’s prolific frontman Paul Mullin as the latter dove in to connect with the ball for a header in the 12th minute of the game, but fell to the turf after the goalkeeper’s knee pounded into his chest.
Mullin received treatment from both clubs’ set of medics for several minutes and later left the pitch breathing through a gas and air tank, meanwhile, the 23-year-old Red was brandished a yellow card and met with loud boos when the booking was announced by the stadium speaker.
It was confirmed after the match that Mullin had suffered a punctured lung.
Parkinson reacts, United displeased
When reacting to the incident post-match with Beanyman Sports, Parkinson said: “I’m fuming about it, I’ve got to be honest. It was a clumsy, reckless challenge in a pre-season game. Yeah, can’t say any more on it. I’m not happy with it at all.”
The coach was then asked if Bishop had approached his side to apologise and he answered: “I haven’t seen the goalie and he’s probably best steering clear of us for the time being because we’re not very happy with him.”
Bishop penned a tweet to the striker expressing his upset at the situation, while The Telegraph has since confirmed that United are ‘unhappy’ with Parkinson’s comments as they feel it will ‘unnecessarily inflame a difficult situation and drive online abuse towards the player’.
Just wanted to share my sincerest apologies to @PMullin7 A complete misjudgement and a genuine accident with 0 malicious intent at all!
Wishing you the speediest recovery and hope to see you back scoring goals as soon as possible!— nath (@natthb13) July 26, 2023
