At the bottom, La Liga are arguing over VAR – they overlooked an offside goal. Federation and league blame each other

Cadiz demands to replay the last 10 minutes.

The struggle for survival in La Liga is traditionally hot. On January 16, Cadiz hosted Elche from 19th place, closing the table. Dispersed 1:1, but not in peace.

All because of a refereeing scandal – the goal of Elche forward Ezequiel Ponce was scored from offside. But the main referee Carlos del Cerro Grande counted it.

Yes, the screenshot was taken at an angle. But the leaders of the judges have already recognized the error.

Then a strange insider from Mundo Deportivo with reference to Diario de Cádiz – supposedly side referee Guadalupe Porras asked the VAR to check the goal for offside, but they did not listen to her.

First, referees don’t have to ask VAR for anything, especially when it comes to a goal. Every moment is viewed as such.

Secondly, such appeals are not provided for by the protocol. VAR turns itself on when it sees a potential error.

Perhaps we will find out the details, but so far it looks like a double mistake: first the linesman overlooked the offside, and then the judges in the VAR center. Perhaps it’s a matter of technical nuances.

Because of this moment, La Liga unexpectedly cut down with the federation

After the match, Cadiz head coach Sergio Gonzalez said that del Cerro Grande himself did not deny the mistake: “I talked to him and he admitted it. He’s sad.”

The Technical Refereeing Committee (CTA) called Chief Referee Carlos del Cerro Grande’s mistake “inexcusable” and said that video assistant Javier Iglesias Villanueva will face consequences.

The committee also urged La Liga to implement a semi-automatic offside detection system, similar to the one used in the 2022 World Cup and Spanish Super Cup matches.

“It is impossible to eliminate human errors, but it is possible to avoid them in offside situations if you use a semi-automatic tool. Therefore, we call for the introduction of semi-automatic offside technology after the experience in the last Spanish Super Cup,” the CTA said in a statement.

The league responded harshly: “On behalf of La Liga, we deplore the CTA’s grotesque statement to the Royal Spanish Football Federation, in which they, without admitting their responsibility and without apologizing, are trying to shift the blame to an organization completely unrelated to refereeing, – to La Liga.

Due to an error by the referees, Cadiz demanded that the end of this match be replayed from the 81st minute. Here is the club’s statement:

“The legal services of Cadiz submitted a protest to the competent authorities regarding the results of the meeting with Elche, requesting the annulment of the result of the match and its resumption from the 81st minute and from the same moment at which the refereeing team counted the goal, despite the fact that it was preceded by a loud, blatant and inexplicable offside, which can be seen on the video from the match.”

Video assistants Javier Iglesias Villanueva and Isidro Diaz de Meru were temporarily suspended from refereeing after the game.

And what kind of referees worked at the match?

The game was served by a referee team led by 46-year-old Carlos del Cerro Grande. He has been refereeing La Liga matches since 2011, and in 2013 he became a FIFA referee. Del Cerro Grande has already officiated 156 games, but there are more experienced Spanish referees: in the top 3 are Mateu Laos (263 matches), Eduardo Iturraldo Gonzalez (284 matches) and Alberto Undiano Mallenco (346 matches).

Carlos del Cerro Grande did not only referee inside Spain: he worked in a total of 22 games of the Champions League and Europa League, and also went to the women’s World Cup 2019 and men’s Euro 2020.

Linesman Porras Ayuso is in her fourth season at the top level, having previously worked in the lower divisions and refereed the Spanish Women’s Championship. Porras, 35, is already in the history of women’s judging.

She is the first Spanish female referee to have worked on:

• La Liga match,

• Europa League match,

• final of the Spanish Cup,

• major international tournament (Women’s World Cup 22 U20 and Euro 22),

• Champions League match (Napoli vs Liverpool in the 2022/23 Champions League group stage).

According to the refereeing committee of Spain, Guadalupe is now in the top 5 assistants in La Liga.

In Spain, because of the judges, they make a lot of noise

Spanish refereeing superstar Mateu Laos is now under criticism.

His three recent matches have been spectacular.

During the games Argentina – the Netherlands and Barcelona – Espanyol, Laos showed a total of 31 yellow and 3 red cards – even for the Spanish judges, this is a bit too much. .

The patience of the Spanish refereeing union burst after the unique match of the Spanish Cup “Linares” – “Sevilla” (0:5): only 7 fouls for each team and not a single (!) Card for the players for the entire match. However, instead of the players, Laos sent off Sevilla coach Jorge Sampaoli in the 18th minute for too violent expression of emotions.

His work was rated low and temporarily suspended, the result – since January 4, Laos has not played a single match.