Jeff Winter: Some Boro fans blamed me for Mark Clattenburg's mistake - I wasn't even at the game!

Mark Clattenburg’s failure to spot a clear foul on Dimi Konstantopoulos late on in the Blackburn game soon led to yours truly getting grief on social media.

Bizarrely, fans expected me to defend him but why should I?

I’m as big a Boro fan as most and go to as many games as I can, rarely missing a match home or away.

Due to speaking engagements I wasn’t at the Riverside on Saturday but, then again, neither were around 5,000 other fans who decided not to return after attending the Bournemouth game.

I was gutted to miss Juninho’s return to his spiritual home and the chance to pay my respects to former manager John Neil.

By all accounts I missed a good match and a dominant performance from our heroes.

All of that fades into insignificance though with the main talking point, namely Mark Clattenburg’s failure to award Boro a free kick rather and allow Blackburn to grab a totally undeserved point that prevented Aitor Karanka’s men from going joint top of the table.

Just because I used to be a referee - without being too egotistical, a very good one at that - it amuses me that I seem to held responsible in some quarters for every decision that goes against the Boro.

So why, I hear you ask, wasn’t the goal ruled out? I wish I knew.

Usually, you only have to breathe on a keeper and the whistle goes.

I don’t know what his excuse may be for failing to spot the contact on the keeper, maybe his view was blocked due to a crowded penalty area.

That’s no excuse, though, he should have positioned himself fully aware of what the likely outcome of a last gasp corner was going to be.

Without doubt his failure to penalise Blackburn and rule out the goal cost Boro two points.

Perhaps, as the dust settles, some more astute supporters might also realise that the opposing keeper having a worldie and a string of missed chances were also major contributing factors as to why Boro weren’t out of sight before the added time drama.

Refereeing mistakes have cost us against Leeds and Blackburn but failure to score goals have cost us more points than dodgy decisions by officials.

That is not me defending refs or making excuses, it’s fact.