Gary O’Neil expects refereeing standards in the Premier League to improve after the Wolves boss held talks with Howard Webb in the hours after his team’s defeat at Sheffield United.

O’Neil’s men were undone by a controversial late penalty when George Baldock tumbled under a challenge from Fabio Silva, despite minimal contact between the players.

Wolves were also on the wrong end of contentious decisions against Manchester United, Luton and Newcastle earlier in the campaign.

‘I had a good conversation with Howard Webb on Sunday – a very open one around trying to improve things,’ said O’Neil. ‘I understand where he is. He is trying to run his own team as well and they are obviously under a lot of pressure at the moment.

‘After the chat I am confident they are trying to shift things in the right direction and to make put things in place to ensure there are fewer errors.

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Gary O’Neil has said he expects refereeing standards to improve in the Premier League

‘They don’t want to be making errors every weekend and having me phoning on a Sunday and having clubs releasing statements, that’s not what they need either.

‘They understand that the things that have gone against us this year probably shouldn’t have. There’s probably an agreement that a lot of the decisions that have gone against us have been incorrect.’

O’Neil was careful not to blame the stoppage-time penalty for his side’s defeat and accepted their own shortcomings in the match.

But speaking to the Wolves Weekly podcast, O’Neil could not hide his frustration at the impact these disputed calls have had on his side’s points tally.

He added: ‘However many points it may have cost us so far, we can’t get them back. Even if things start to go our way or we get our fair share from now, we’ll still be that many points short of what we could have been