Airdrie No.2 questions Josh Rae handball award amid "uncharacteristic" mistakes in Ayr defeat

dailyrecord.co.uk:

Airdrie player/assistant boss Callum Fordyce reckons goalkeeper Josh Rae shouldn't have been penalised for handball in the lead up to Ayr's winner on Saturday.And the defender - who didn't play due to injury - admits the errors that led to The Honest Men's goals were "uncharacteristic".The Diamonds are licking their wounds after a narrow 3-2 defeat at home to Scott Brown's side saw their five-game unbeaten run in the Championship come to an end, whilst sending them down to sixth in the table.Ayr pounced on slips by Cammy Ballantyne and Craig Watson - who both happened to atone somewhat with Airdrie's only goals - and went on to win courtesy of an Anton Dowds hat-trick.A moment of controversy arose in 78 minutes when Rae was judged to have handled the ball outside the box, earning him a booking.

Ayr then took a quick free-kick which saw Dowds curl the ball into an empty net for his hat-trick, as Rae tried to get back to his goal.That in itself drew criticism from Airdrie boss Rhys McCabe, who claims referee Alan Muir 'doesn't know the laws of the game' after allowing a quick free-kick to take place.However, Fordyce reckons Rae shouldn't have been penalised in the first place.He said: "I'm not 100 per cent sure Josh has handled the ball outside the box."It looks like he was inside the box when he has touched it, but it is one of those ones where the referee has made a decision and we need to react better."I think it [the mistakes in the game] was uncharacteristic of us."We have been on a great run but we are not the finished article so we know we have to improve, learn from it and move on."We can't criticise the boys.