Sean Dyche felt Burnley produced a “thorough performance” to beat Watford 1-0 and while he described Marvin Zeegelaar’s red card as “a definite sending off”, he also had reason to question referee Lee Probert and his team of officials after seeing two second-half goals disallowed for offside.

Chris Wood was the first to be denied by the assistant’s flag after tapping in Jack Cork’s centre – the former Hornets loanee the player to be adjudged offside – but confusion reigned when substitute Ashley Barnes also had a goal ruled out after the ball had broken for him off an opponent.

Ultimately, the decisions did not cost the Clarets following Scott Arfield’s goal at the end of the first half had come a couple of minutes after Zeegelaar had seen red for a two-footed challenge on Steven Defour.

“It’s not easy to win games in the Premier League but we had the chances and scored a couple that were chalked off,” the former Hornets boss reflected. “They’re delicate decisions and if they fathom them out, particularly the one that bounces off someone and falls to Barnesy, rightly that’s the way it goes. But it was a confusing moment, I think everyone will agree. Their players don’t react at all, other than that’s a goal, which is not always a sign but it sometimes is.

“But other than that they went down to 10 men and then it’s the old favourite, sometimes the hardest fight to win is the one you’re meant to and I thought we saw the game pretty thoroughly through.

“Their keeper has made two top-class saves from Johann Gudmundsson and a couple of other decent saves but we’ve done enough to win the game, I’m sure of that.”

Dyche admitted: “We didn’t start very well. Credit to them because we didn’t start well for the first 15 or 20 [minutes]. But then we grew into the game and the feeling in the stadium started to change when the players started getting back on the front foot. And then the sending off makes a difference. A thorough performance I thought.”