Fulham boss Marco Silva refuses to comment on controversial West Ham United goal

Head coach Marco Silva has admitted that he did want to risk further punishment by commenting on a controversial goal scored by West Ham United against Fulham on Sunday afternoon.

The Cottagers went into the London derby looking to respond to their 4-1 defeat at the hands of Newcastle United last weekend, and appeared on course for a positive result at one stage.

Andreas Pereira gave Fulham an early lead, but a Jarrod Bowen penalty was followed by second-half strikes from Gianluca Scamacca and Michail Antonio.

Scamacca's effort, which put the Hammers into the lead, is the effort which will divide opinion, the Italian appearing to handle the ball before continuing his recent scoring streak.

Even though the summer arrival appeared to signal his guilt by not celebrating his well-executed lob, VAR ruled that there was not enough evidence to disallow the goal.

Although the incident ultimately proved pivotal, Silva opted against criticising the officials, instead talking up the performance of his side.

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Speaking to Match of the Day, Silva said: "I will not speak about the referee, sorry, because they will probably come after me and I'll be off the bench or pay a fine. I am not here for that, I am here to manage my players.

"I will not say to you what I think. Can I ask you what you think? Even for the third goal there was a handball about five seconds before. Congratulations to West Ham, they got the three points.

"Until the penalty we were clearly the best team on the pitch. West Ham have a lot of quality and come from two really good seasons but Fulham Football Club were clearly the best team of the pitch.

"We showed personality, character and we like to control the game on the pitch and the penalty changed the balance of the match. We lost some focus and confidence after the penalty."

While Fulham remain in ninth position in the Premier League standings, they now sit just two points above 15th spot and five ahead of the relegation zone.