Idiotic elbow by Lenglet. Idiotic play by Pique in defence and idiotic changes by EV, changing way too much. Good comeback though! Piques goal shows a frickin plan B might save the day, crosses, mayhem in box and headers scored! Still Barca have to pass the ball into goal.
I love Messi, but really bad sportsmanship from Messi at the end --- not shaking the referee's hand. I hate stuff like this.
******** the referee, after the 75th minute, he gave pretty much no Fouls at all. Out of Barca’s last 7 red cards, he handed 4 of them.
I hate unfair and plain bad officiating even more. Seems Messi does too. Don’t read too much into it.
Manzano was also the referee who didn't give Marcelo a red card in the Clasico where Marcelo "unintentionally" elbowed Messi and Messi had blood from his mouth. But still --- you should shake the ref's hand. Just an opinion. This game was not reff'ed correctly, agreed, though.
Meh, it was kind of a red. On the soft side but an elbow is an elbow.. VAR is frustrating though when it comes to the subjective calls. I mean, is not showing a red such a big injustice? So is VAR really needed on subjective things that the ref is well-positioned to see in live time? Also frustrating because Busquets was fouled at the edge of the box in the waning minutes but not reversable since it was not inside the box. Yet would’ve been a great chance for Messi from the FK!
that was disappointing. congrats to Girona for a well earned point. but that red changed everything at a point where we were in complete control, and i'm not convinced Lenglet did much wrong there. the ref was too trigger happy with those cards. it was always going to be a struggle after that (if it wasn't already). unlucky.
There was a foul on Langlet first then the elbow happened as the player ran into him. The player in question apparently apologised to Langlet after the red card. Yes, I am happy that Arthur started but why change the whole MF setup? It was evident that we had no control over midfield. Play with either Arthur or Arturo but don't start them both at the same time and risk having no cohesion in MF... In hindsight.
I thought Vidal was quite good though. Also created the first goal. Getting Lenglet playing time before the match in Wembley makes sense. I don’t have a problem with the starting XI. Busy schedule coming up and its a fixture Barca won 6-1 last season. Makes more sense making several changes today than an away match in Valencia or even in Leganes.
plus coutinho and rakitic had busy summers and needed the rest as much as arthur/arturo needed the minutes.
I agree! It will just lead to more bad decisions against Barca and especially Messi when idiot Manzano is refereeing. As captain he should know better.
"I did apologise to [Lenglet]," Pons said. "I didn't notice the contact from the elbow and I offered my hand to him because I thought it was a foul by me at first. "I don't know if it was an act of aggression. We both went in 100 percent, we both caught each other. In the end, it was VAR that made the decision. I don't know it's a red card or not." http://www.espn.com.au/football/bar...exed-by-clement-lenglets-red-card-with-girona
Yeah but he gave Segio Ramos a red in That game. And didn’t give what could have been a PK for Madrid at the beginning of the game. The Marcelo elbow was hard to see and there was no VAR. And like this one, tough to judge intention ... even more so. With no VAR he probably wouldn’t have given the red. About hand shakes , don’t really care personally. Happens all the time . But perhaps he should just walk off without addressing the ref.