Alex Neil was left frustrated after Jamie Vardy's "good striking play" won a crucial penalty in Leicester City's 2-1 triumph at Norwich City.
England striker Vardy went down under a challenge from Sebastien Bassong in the first half at Carrow Road, with referee Mark Clattenburg awarding the spot-kick despite minimal contact from the centre-back.
Vardy tucked home the penalty and Jeffrey Schlupp's second-half strike settled the match, despite a goal from Norwich substitute Dieumerci Mbokani.
Norwich manager Neil believes the 28-year-old was clever to win the penalty but was more frustrated by the way in which his side surrendered possession in the build-up to the goal.
"It is a hard one to call. I think the lad has played for it," he said after the match. "He has stopped his body and gone down, which you could argue is good striking play from their point of view, but for us it is about losing a slack ball in the middle of the park.
"That was unnecessary and it happened for the second and that is what cost us."
Neil believes Norwich's poor use of the ball was ultimately costly in their third league defeat of the season.
"I think the first half we like to try and control the ball and control the game and if our use of the ball was up to scratch as it generally is we would have had enough quality to break Leicester down," he said.
"Our use of the ball was poor, the way we moved the ball was too slow and it was a bit predictable and Leicester, being a counter-attacking team, were set-up to take advantage of that.
"If you compare it with how quickly we moved the ball at West Ham last week and our quality on the ball and how well we retained it against another counter-attacking team, if we had hit those levels, particularly in the first half, we would have been good enough."
