Football’s authorities will review its rules around penalty kicks after Atletico Madrid’s controversial Champions League exit drew outrage from fans as well as the club’s manager Diego Simeone.
Atletico were knocked out of the last 16 by city rivals Real Madrid after a penalty shootout, but Simeone was furious with officials after Julian Alvarez had his spot-kick retrospectively disallowed by VAR, who deemed the striker to have touched the ball twice before scoring.
The referee did not initially see the double touch by Alvarez and it took video reviews to intervene to erase the goal and leave Real Madrid in position to win.
It wasn’t clear to a frustrated Simeone that the double touch actually happened. The coach asked reporters in the post-match news conference to raise their hands if they thought Alvarez touched the ball twice.
“There you go, no one has raised their hands,” Simeone said. “Next question.”
But the manager also tried to take the positives from a hard-fought performance by his players.
“There is no doubt the fans are hurt because of the elimination, but they know that their team left everything on the field and they deserved the applause that they received. Unfortunately, we couldn’t advance, but I leave in peace.
“Yes, we haven’t been able to beat Real Madrid in the Champions League, but they have always suffered against us. I’m sure that, when they’ll be talking to each other by themselves, they’ll be saying, ‘These guys always made it tough for us’.”
Uefa explained that although Alvarez clearly did not mean to kick the ball with his left foot, which slipped as he went to strike the ball with his right, the laws of the game left the VAR with no choice but to rule out the goal.
The governing body also said it would discuss the rules of the game with Fifa and law-maker Ifab.
A Uefa statement read: “Atletico de Madrid enquired with Uefa over the incident, which led to the disallowance of the kick from the penalty mark taken by Julian Alvarez at the end of yesterday’s Uefa Champions League match against Real Madrid.
“Although minimal, the player made contact with the ball using his standing foot before kicking it, as shown in the attached video clip. Under the current rule (Laws of the Game, Law 14.1), the VAR had to call the referee signalling that the goal should be disallowed.”
It added: “Uefa will enter discussions with Fifa and Ifab to determine whether the rule should be reviewed in cases where a double touch is clearly unintentional.”
