Moyes in the dock

Everton boss David Moyes has been hit with a charge by the Football Association following comments he made about a referee.

Everton are currently trading at 14s with Bodog to win the Uefa Cup. The Toffees are 8th in the Premiership and were very impressive in beating Nuremburg 2-0 in Germany in their last Uefa Cup match.

Ref Mark Clattenburg was allegedly verbally lambasted in the wake of Everton´s derby defeat against Liverpool back in October.

The ref issued marching orders to Everton pair Tony Hibbert and Phil Neville whilst commiting second-half penalties as the Reds won 2-1 at Goodison Park.

The Scotsman´s temper boiled over when Everton were denied a late penalty after Jamie Carragher looked to have commited a foul on Joleon Lescott in the box.

In the same game Dirk Kuyt was  booked for a two-footed lunge at Neville. Moyes expressed his disgust at how the punishments for the two respective offences differed.

After the match Moyes said: "We deserved that penalty if not more and, if the other penalties were more blatant than that, then I am in the wrong game.

"I am seemingly seeing football differently. If the referee does not see that you have got to ask why. Maybe they should not be there."

He added: "It can't just be me being bitter, people asked was the referee biased and I can't comment but we got nothing at all."

Moyes has been charged with two breaches of FA rule E3 in respect of comments he made straight after the match. He also made comments in a press conference the following week.

The FA charge stated that "it is alleged that the comments made referring to referee Mark Clattenburg on each respective occasion amount to improper conduct as they call into question Mr Clattenburg's integrity and/or imply that Mr Clattenburg was motivated by bias".

Moyes has until mid December to answer charges.