Buter blasts officiating after Sporting Lagos drop points against Barau FC
Sporting Lagos rescued a point.
Jeffery Buter still left angry.
The Tech Boys came from behind to draw 1-1 with unbeaten Barau FC at the Mobolaji Johnson Arena, but the Sporting Lagos coach used his post-match reaction to turn the spotlight onto the officiating.
Barau struck first through Joseph Atule from the penalty spot before Sodiq Ayoade pulled Sporting level after the break.
The comeback earned Sporting a point.
For Buter, it did not erase the frustration.
Barau land the first punch
Sporting Lagos thought they had gone ahead midway through the first half when Joel Ajibola converted a rebound, but the effort was ruled out for offside.
Barau then made their own opening count.
Stanley Oganbor was fouled inside the area and Atule converted the resulting penalty to put the visitors in front.
That forced Sporting to chase the game.
They eventually found their response after half-time.
Haruna Hadi delivered from the flank, Aliyu Baba’s header came back off the crossbar and Ayoade reacted quickest to the loose ball to make it 1-1.
Neither side found the winner.
Buter turns the heat on the referee
The final whistle did not cool Buter’s mood.
The Sporting Lagos coach criticised referee Abubakar Abdullahi’s handling of the game and described the officiating as the poorest his side had experienced this season.
Buter was especially unhappy with what he said was the referee’s interaction with Sporting Lagos players and the treatment of his captain when attempting to communicate with the official.
Those claims remain Buter’s account of the match.
There is no official finding establishing bias or misconduct by the referee, and the criticism should be read as the coach’s post-match position rather than a proven conclusion.
Sporting fight back — but home points slip away again
Beyond the officiating debate, Sporting Lagos still have a football problem to solve.
They recovered from a losing position.
They showed enough pressure to force an equaliser.
But they did not turn the momentum into three points.
That matters for a team trying to make home advantage count.
The draw gives Sporting something from the match, but it also leaves another game in which they did not fully cash in on their own pressure.
Barau leave Lagos still unbeaten
For Barau FC, the point tells a different story.
They went away to Sporting Lagos, took the lead and left with their unbeaten run intact.
That is the kind of result that keeps a strong start alive even without a victory.
Sporting will look at the game and see two points left behind.
Barau can look at the same 90 minutes and see an unbeaten record preserved under pressure.
The argument will travel — the table will matter more
Buter’s frustration will dominate the reaction.
That is inevitable.
But Sporting Lagos cannot afford to let the refereeing argument become bigger than the football question underneath it.
They fought back.
They created pressure.
They stayed in the contest.
Now they need to start turning more of those performances into wins.
Barau leave with their unbeaten run alive.
Sporting leave with a point, a grievance — and the harder job of converting pressure into results.