Manchester United manager Alex Ferguson accused referees of refusing to give his side penalties after they were held 0-0 by Manchester City in Sunday's derby.

Ferguson claimed officials were scared of giving spot kicks in the wake of a controversial penalty awarded to United in their 2-0 home victory over champions Arsenal two weeks ago when Wayne Rooney went down under Sol Campbell's challenge.

He felt United should have been awarded two penalties in the opening 15 minutes of a game which ended with Alan Smith being sent off.

"I have seen the penalties at halftime and they were clear penalties, there is no dispute about that," Ferguson told the post-match news conference.

"But we are being penalised for getting the penalty against Arsenal. We are not allowed to get them now.

"You will have to hit someone with an axe before we get a penalty.

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"I don't know what you do about that. I mean the laws of the game are there... They were pulled back, (Mikael) Silvestre was, (Louis) Saha was."

Ferguson also criticised referee Graham Poll for sending Smith off for two bookable offences. It was the 10th red card of the England and former Leeds United striker's career.

"I will have to see it again," Ferguson said. "He's only made two tackles in the whole game and when you see the number of fouls they gave away and there were only two yellow cards for them in the game it seems absolutely ridiculous."

Ferguson accepted his side will have to improve their form if they are to mount a serious title challenge.

United are now 11 points behind leaders Chelsea and with no goals in their last two league games including last weekend's 2-0 loss at Portsmouth they have failed to capitalise on their victory over Arsenal.

"One win in five (league) games isn't championship form and you can't excuse anyone in our club for that," Ferguson said.

"We are not good enough to win the championship on that display."

City manager Kevin Keegan said Sunday's result would help lift his side's prestige.

"I think people now know there's another team in this city," he said.

"Last year Alex Ferguson said they considered Liverpool to be their derby game.