Officials cost West Ham the chance to beat Southampton, claims Sam Allardyce

Probert appeared to miss two clear penalty claims for handball against Rickie Lambert and Jos Hooiveld in the opening 15 minutes.

And when the Premier League official did finally point to the spot, after Mark Noble was tripped by Morgan Schneiderlin, he promptly sent Matt Taylor off for shoving Billy Sharp in the resulting melee.

Noble picked himself up to score his seventh goal from seven penalties this season, but Hooiveld equalised for the 11 men in the second half to
secure a 1-1 draw for second-placed Saints.

"I'm disappointed Matt Taylor raised his hands, but it's in his chest, not his face, and they tell me the rules say that's a booking, not a red," said Upton Park boss Allardyce.

"Sharp held his face and rolled over on the floor which tells the assistant referee he has hit him in the face.

"I'm also disappointed we should have had two penalties. I've looked at them four times, and the second one is a sending-off as well as a penalty.

"You've got to guess Mark is going to score them so we could have had the game won before the sending-off - so that's left a bitter taste.

"In our point of view the major decisions have gone the wrong way. I don't want the officials taking away what we are striving for and I thought the officials tried to do that today, which was a
shame."

Allardyce's side had to play the majority of the game a man light for the second match running after Kevin Nolan saw red nine minutes into last weekend's win over Millwall.

Taylor's red came after 18 minutes and the 10 men stood firm for the rest of the first half with Rob Green producing fine saves to deny Sharp and Lambert.

But they could not deal with Danny Fox's free-kick 16 minutes from time and Hooiveld, who scored the winner when the teams met at St Mary's in October, prodded in the equaliser.

Saints manager Nigel Adkins admitted Probert had an "interesting" evening, and felt he got the one penalty decision he did give wrong.

"No, in my opinion it's wasn't a penalty. He didn't touch him," said Adkins.

On Taylor's red card, he added: "The referee has been put in a position where he has had to make a decision, there was a coming-together.

"The referee has made a call, I also thought he didn't see a handball for us. I didn't see the ones Sam was appealing for.

"We had opportunities to win it. They defended resolutely and I'm sure they'll be happy with a point."