Jamie Vardy antics: Jon Moss deserves praise for his handling of Leicester vs West Ham

Jon Moss must have woken up this morning, turned on the radio, flicked through the newspapers and clicked through the sports websites - and felt like going back to bed.

“The inconsistencies were mind-boggling,” said Alan Shearer of the referee’s handling of Sunday’s frantic 2-2 draw between Leicester City and West Ham. “I’d give him a three out of 10 and I think I’m being quite generous,” said Ian Wright. “A good match ruined by a poor referee,” was how one respected football writer put it. “Is that ref on drugs?” asked Peter Schmeichel slightly more hysterically.

But does Moss really deserve all this venom, derision and mockery?

Let’s take Jamie Vardy first. Shortly before he was given his first yellow card, he slid in on a West Ham defender, was late and caught him. Moss spoke to the Leicester striker and presumably it was to warn him about that sort of tackle in the future, rather than to enquire if he’d slept well.

So could Vardy really complain when moments later he did it again and found himself booked? True, contact with Cheikhou Kouyate was minimal. In fact, the West Ham player almost tripped over a prone Vardy after the striker had missed him. But going to ground the way he did and sliding in - shortly after being warned - was worthy of a yellow card.

Then the second caution: Moss was spot on in not pointing to the spot. Vardy intentionally jumped in front of a retreating Angelo Ogbonna in order to try to deceive Moss into awarding him a penalty - a piece of deception he has used before this season, against Arsenal being one example, when he ran into Nacho Monreal to win a penalty.

On Sunday, it wasn’t a dive, as such, because there was plenty of contact that took the Leicester man to earth - because he initiated it. It was a foul on Ogbonna for Vardy impeding the West Ham man’s attempts to get the ball. A yellow? Why not? He deliberately fouled his opponent with no attempt to play the ball. Vardy’s ugly rant was probably triggered by embarrassment at being rumbled, rather than anger at being tumbled.

As for the manhandling in the box that disfigured the closing stages of the contest, how can Moss be blamed for not seeing every incident? He can only have eyes on one pair of wrestling players at a time - and they all seemed to be tied in knots at every set-piece. Much like Vardy, he warned Wes Morgan to keep his wandering hands to himself moments before he penalised the Leicester captain who failed to heed the advice when he tugged at Winston Reid. How can Morgan complain about that?

Yes, there were other examples where - after seeing the replays or having the tangoing pair of players highlighted - penalties could have been given - but the protagonists can hardly complain when they are making the task so difficult for the man in black.

It is hard to defend the referee for his final act in the match - the penalty awarded against Andy Carroll leaves Moss on slippery ground. It was a poor decision, but the official could be forgiven for having a scrambled brain by this point such were the Machiavellian shenanigans he had to try to untangle to that point.

How about we give Moss the benefit of the doubt - and play on?