FC Barcelona endured a night to forget as they were thrashed 4-0 by Atletico Madrid in the first leg of the Copa del Rey semi-final at the Metropolitano Stadium. It was one of the heaviest defeats of the Hansi Flick era and left the Catalan side frustrated both by their performance and by a major refereeing controversy.
Some fans, in their frustration, even joked online that losing a bet on a $2 deposit casino would have been less stressful than watching this collapse.
With the score already at 4-0 in favour of the home side, Barcelona briefly thought they had pulled a goal back at the very start of the second half. A move inside the Atletico penalty area ended with a shot from Pau Cubarsi that beat goalkeeper Musso. However, referee Juan Martinez Munuera immediately held play as a VAR review began.
What followed was an unusually long check that lasted close to seven minutes. In the end, the goal was ruled out for offside, but what caught the attention of players, staff, and viewers was the absence of the usual semi-automated offside technology graphic on the broadcast. Instead, the officials relied on manually drawn offside lines, something rarely seen since the introduction of SAOT.
According to information reported by Mundo Deportivo, the offside was triggered by a second touch with the heel of the Polish striker during the build-up, which placed Cubarsi in an illegal position. The VAR team initially attempted to use the skeleton-based SAOT system, but the technology failed to generate a correct model because of the very high density of players inside the box.
The Technical Committee of Referees later issued an official explanation, using the following wording from their statement.
“With regard to the goal factually disallowed for FC Barcelona, in the assessment of the play and in accordance with the protocol, the VAR team carried out the analysis using the semi-automated offside system (SAOT). During this analysis, it was detected that the system generated a failure in the modelling of players through the skeletons, due to a situation involving a very high density of players.
After attempting to recalibrate the modelling and confirming that this was not possible, and following the established procedure, the VAR team proceeded to draw the offside lines manually in order to reach the final and correct decision. For this reason, and on an exceptional basis, the assessment process of the play took longer than usual and made it impossible to send the recreation to the television production, as it was not possible to operate using the SAOT system.”
Despite this explanation, the episode has intensified the sense of grievance within the Barcelona camp. The club believes the incident compounded an already damaging night and, according to sources close to the board, they are considering lodging a formal complaint with the RFEF over the refereeing decisions in Madrid.
