Gary Neville was on co-commentary as his beloved Salford City upset Leeds United on penalties in the second round of the Carabao Cup on Tuesday night.
The Ammies hosted the Championship side at the Peninsula Stadium in a fixture which was televised live on Sky Sports.
Neville is of course a regular pundit and co-commentary for Sky's Premier League coverage but isn't typically involved when it comes to the League Cup.However, the Manchester United legend was in the gantry to call the action in a game involving the club he owns with other members of the Class of 92, including David Beckham, Paul Scholes, Ryan Giggs and Nicky Butt.
Neville had more responsibilities than the rest of his former teammates as he was serving as CEO up until October 2022 before stepping down.
Salford went 1-0 up through former Leeds striker Matt Smith, who produced a bullet header from Luke Garbutt's cross in the 34th minute.That led to Neville reacting in similar fashion to the classic goalgasm he produced when Fernando Torres scored for Chelsea away at Barcelona in 2012.Pascal Struijk equalised for Leeds in the 76th minute but the very same noise was heard again when the decisive penalty was converted by midfielder Ossama Ashley, who sent Salford into the third round for the first time ever.But plenty of viewers did not like the fact that Neville was commentating on his own team and vented their frustrations on social media.
One fumed: "Gary Neville on co-comms on the game involving a team he owns is ridiculous.'
A second asked: Is having Gary on co-comms not a conflict of interest a bit?"
A third chimed in: :"Ex-Man United player and co-owner of Salford City Gary Neville being on co-commentary for a match between Salford City and Leeds United is... weird?"
A fourth user agreed, saying: "Just as a general principle, it is not right that Gary Neville, as a club club owner, should commentate on that game.A fifth person wrote: "Nice to see fair, unbiased commentary on Sky again today. Since when has Gary Neville ever had an interest in the first few rounds of the League Cup? He’ll be ghosting until the final now."
A final user added: "Under no circumstances should Gary Neville be allowed to be doing commentary on the football team he owns."Neville was brought in for a post-match interview afterwards and revealed he is desperate for Salford to meet United in the next round.
"I mean the answer you want me to give you is Manchester United," he told Sky Sports.
"Obviously us lads as owners of this club, it's our club - we love Manchester United and we love this club as well.
"We're hugely ambitious about what we want to do but we now that Manchester United has given us everything in our lives.
"To be able to have the opportunity to play against Manchester United, I'd love it to be here at this ground because I think it would be special."
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