It would be amiss to argue that AC Milan lost because of refereeing decisions against Monza, but Tuttosport have criticised his performance and a couple of big errors he made.
The newspaper (via MilanNews) are highly critical of Colombo who had to make a couple of big calls in the game, namely the penalty that led to Monza’s opening goal and then the Luka Jovic red card.
It was actually the incident that led to goalkeeper Di Gregorio’s injury and consequently to a free-kick for Monza for a (non-existent) foul by Theo Hernandez that they put under the microscope above all else.
In fact, Tuttosport claim that it was Andrea Carboni who brought down Theo Hernandez and the mistake proved to be doubly serious because the penalty whistled for Monza arose precisely from the non-existent foul on Theo which gave a free-kick to the home side.
On the red card, Jovic was sent off after a VAR consultation which appeared to show that he lashed out towards Izzo, but the paper mention that Izzo’s repeated provocations were not spotted.
The Italian defender and the Serbian striker had a coming together not long before the red card incident, which the referee clearly failed to defuse.
Despite the missing Milan-penalty (which I was furious about!) the referee had probably the best display I’ve seen in Italy for years. He had nerves to watch the advantage thing long enough and whistled even 3-5 seconds after the foul if the fouled team lost the ball. Brilliant work.
But I will NEVER understand how Monza got a freekick where Theo was rugby-tackled on the ground and the tackler collided with Di Gregorio. It makes zero sense to give a freekick to Monza. INSANE!
Massive? Hardly. He blew for a foul that wasn’t a foul. You’re wrongly implying that’s what lead to the penalty, it didn’t. Thiaw is a buffoon, that’s what lead to the penalty. It’s risky enough to tackle outside the box, inside the box, it’s death. If Thiaw had any brains he would simply shield the player and force his back, as any intelligent defender would do.
Jovic was hard done by. Izzo kept moving forward and shoving Jovic at base of his neck. The last time Jovic sensed him coming. Spun around and pushed back in an equal manner.
The Monza defender flops to the floor as if he has been belted in the face.
Referee comes to the monitor on instruction from VAR and has one look of a slow motion replay from the worst angle. Which didn’t show as clearly what Izzo was doing.
I acknowledge that Jovic was sucked in and shouldn’t retaliate.
Surely VAR should also help highlight when players are exaggerating contact.
That’s not the point. You can’t retaliate. You’re a professional. And players irritate other players on purpose all the time. Gotta keep your cool.
It’s funny.. irritating is “professional” or at least ignored, but you show a little bit of aggression and boom. Red card. 3 match ban.
I miss when we had mexes when he’d punch people out mid game and got away with it. Not that i approve of that but dude had ballz of steel
I agree that you can’t retaliate. And when you do a red is the likely consequence.
But the VAR/on field system is flawed on this instance. Other angles showed the contact was minimal and an equal act of both players pushing at each other.
If the on field is coming over to the monitor to make a huge decision.
He should watch more than one slow motion of the worst angle.
He’s not making a fully informed decision. He’s making it on a cherry picked freeze frame.
Thiaw is awful !!!
I thought they didn’t give a pen against Monza on DeGregario’s injury because he was injured though by his own player. Theo was clearly shoved in the back. He did very well to duck the goalie and avoid a collision from the shove. Smh. I was wondering why it wasn’t reviewed tbh. Theo even went over to the ref to ask him about it