The referee of Barcelona’s Spanish match against Paris Saint-Germain in the Champions League received a lot of criticism for his mismanagement of the match.
It is worth noting that the first leg, which brought together the two teams in the same round, was at the Parc des Princes Stadium, the home of Paris, and ended with the visitors winning by three goals to two
Thus, the Catalan club bid farewell to the Champions League competition, while the French team qualified for the semi-finals to set up a fiery match with Germany’s Borussia Dortmund
During the course of the match, there were many scenes of exciting refereeing controversy from Romanian referee Istvan Kovac, who ran the Montjuïc arena
The Romanian referee showed the red card to Uruguayan player Ronald Araujo, and also issued a warning to his Polish colleague Robert Lewandowski
He also issued a yellow card to La Fuente, the goalkeeping coach, and Oscar Hernandez, Xavi’s assistant, while expelling the coach from the field
The newspaper “Sport” published the following footage of the referee: “Apart from the expulsion, which was completely arbitrary, the referee punished Barcelona with the hammer”
She continued: “The absolute leniency towards the Paris Saint-Germain players and the loud behavior that could have returned Barcelona to a draw: a penalty kick carried out by Marquinhos on Gundogan, which could have been the second for the French central defender.”
She concluded: “Kovac solved the problem by warning Gundogan for pretending to fall through the Video Assistant Referee (VAR) technique. “He wrote that Barca cannot reach the semi-finals.”
Spanish referee Eduardo Iturralde also made a huge surprise about Araujo’s expulsion against Paris Saint-Germain. The arbitration expert confirmed to the newspaper “AS” that the player’s expulsion was incorrect and that the player’s behavior was not even a mistake and therefore he did not deserve the expulsion.
