The police officer in command at Hillsborough when 96 people were killed in a crush called for police dogs instead of ambulances, even after he realised he was facing a medical emergency, not an incident of disorder.

Former Ch Supt David Duckenfield, giving evidence for the fourth day at the new inquests into the 1989 football disaster, said he realised there was a medical emergency when he saw a man collapse on the pitch at 3.04pm.

Yet the next entry on the South Yorkshire police log of radio instructions was a call for police dog handlers to come to the football ground, which was hosting the FA Cup semi-final between Liverpool and Nottingham Forest.

Rajiv Menon QC, questioning Duckenfield on behalf of 75 families whose relatives were killed in the crush in the overcrowded central “pens” of Hillsborough’s Leppings Lane terrace, asked him: “It’s a medical emergency. Can you explain that? Why on earth do you need dogs at the stadium?”

Duckenfield said he had “no idea” why he had requested dog handlers, but said it was not because he still believed at the time he was facing crowd disorder or a pitch invasion. He said he may have wanted to create a “secure area” for the rescue operation.

“So dogs requested, ambulances yet to be requested. Correct?” Menon asked.

“It would appear so,” Duckenfield replied.

Menon put to Duckenfield that he never declared a major incident, which would have prompted fire brigade crews with cutting equipment and ambulances being called to the ground. Duckenfield admitted on his first day of evidence that he did not know the codeword – “catastrophe” – used by South Yorkshire police to declare a major incident.

At 3.06pm the police log noted Duckenfield called for operational support – a request for all available police officers to go to the stadium – which Menon said would suggest to them it was a disorder incident rather than an unfolding disaster with injured and dying people.

Menon asked: “Why more manpower?”

“To help the rescue,” Duckenfield replied.

Menon responded: “What rescue? You have yet to call for ambulances or fire crews.”

Duckenfield agreed with Menon that in a crushing incident “every second counts” if lives were to be saved, but denied that the orders he gave were “too little, too late”. He said that although the police log does not record him declaring a major incident, he believes he did, but in the “manic” atmosphere of the control box, junior officers did not have time to record it. He said it was “one of my failings” that he did not insist his declaration was entered in the log.

He agreed with Menon, who showed him a series of photographs and film of the pens as they became packed, that he did not realise the pens were overcrowded at any point on the day before the crush happened and the match was stopped at 3.06pm.

Duckenfield, who was inexperienced at football policing before he was promoted to command the semi-final, was presented with evidence from Colin Allen, a Merseyside policeman who went to the match as a Liverpool supporter and survived the crush. Allen said that having policed hundreds of football matches and attended thousands as a fan, the policing outside the Leppings Lane turnstiles, where Duckenfield accepted police lost control, was “non-existent or shambolic at best”.

Duckenfield replied: “Sir, I was not outside the turnstiles, but I am not in a position to dispute his view.”

Questioned by Michael Mansfield QC, for the same 75 bereaved families, Duckenfield said he did believe that Liverpool fans turned up late and drunk and said colleagues from Merseyside police failed to tell the South Yorkshire force that Liverpool fans were in the habit of doing that.

Mansfield said: “But this isn’t what happened on this day, this wasn’t fans turning up late, having got into a drunken state, was it?”

Duckenfield insisted: “I will have to disagree.”

Pressed on whether he had any information before the disaster happened that fans turned up drunk and late, Duckenfield replied: “I can’t recall, Sir.”

He confirmed that he accepted he did not act as a “reasonably competent match commander” on the day, when he ordered a large exit gate to be opened to relieve the serious congestion outside the ground but failed to foresee the incoming fans would go into the overcrowded pens. He denied, however, that his leadership at the match was “woefully inadequate” and denied again that he had been negligent or grossly negligent.

After Duckenfield mentioned the contribution in the police control room of the then superintendent Bernard Murray, who has since died, Menon asked him if he was seeking to blame other people.

“Sir, I am the man in overall control,” he replied. “I seek guidance from people with greater experience and expertise than me. But ultimately the buck stops with me.

“The easiest thing in my position is to blame others, and I am not doing that.”

The inquests continue.