Atletico Madrid manager Diego Simeone has voiced his disagreement with the decision to disallow Julian Alvarez’s penalty against Real Madrid.
Alvarez stepped up to take Atletico’s second penalty during an intense shootout after his team secured a 1-0 victory in the second leg of their Champions League round-of-16 clash, leveling the aggregate score at 2-2.
The former Manchester City striker slipped during his attempt, but the ball still soared into the back of the net. However, before Real’s Federico Valverde could take the subsequent penalty, a VAR review was initiated. ..Continue Reading
Polish VAR official Tomasz Kwiatkowski determined that Alvarez’s standing foot had made contact with the ball prior to his strike, nullifying the goal and recording it as a miss.
This ruling handed Real Madrid a crucial advantage, and they capitalized on it to win the shootout 4-2 and progress to the quarter-finals.
Simeone was skeptical of the decision, saying in his post-match press conference: “I’ve just seen the images, the referee says Julian touches the ball with his supporting leg, but the ball doesn’t move.
“That’s debatable, whether it was a goal or not. But I’m proud of my players, I’m honestly happy, because we competed in an exemplary way.”
The Argentine added: “When Julian kicks [the penalty], the ball doesn’t even move a bit. I imagine that they called the VAR and saw that he touched it. I want to believe that they’ll have seen that he touched it.”
Simeone then told journalists who were in the room: “Raise your hand, anyone who saw Julian touch it twice. Who is going to raise their hand? Nobody has raised their hand.”
Real shot-stopper Thibaut Courtois, who used to play for Atletico under Simeone, accused them of ‘victimhood’. I felt that he touched the ball twice and I told the referee. It’s not easy to see that. It was a bit of bad luck,” Courtois explained. “For UEFA, it’s clear. I’m sick of this victimhood, always crying about things like this.
“Referees don’t want to benefit one team or another in Spain or in Europe, for them it was clear. With the technology, in the VAR room they saw it clearly, they have a lot of cameras and a lot of images.”
Ancelotti agreed and concluded: “It looks to me like he touches it with his left foot. [Penalties] are a lottery, heads or tails. It came up heads today. Atletico go out with their heads high.”
Real Madrid will face Arsenal in the quarter-finals, playing the first leg away on April 8 before the second game at home on April 16.
