Pol Fernández clears in his goal line. It bounces off Cristian Lema. The ball returns over the goal. It seems like it will be a goal, but Sergio Romero stretches, hits the miraculous slap and deflects it… Assistant judge Juan Pablo Belatti validates it. River takes a 2-1 lead, but… From the VAR they notify the main referee Yael Falcón Pérez that the action must be reviewed. And a few minutes later, they annul the goal that all the ‘millionaires’ had sung. It was a key situation, because after a while Boca scored twice and headed towards their Superclásico victory.
Why wasn’t the phantom goal scored? Super classic and the controversy was left open? Because in the Argentine soccer championships the VAR does not include the automatic goal detection system. There is no GoalRef: no sensors in the goals or a microchip in the ball to determine if it went in. So, the VAR authorities had to draw lines to make the decision.
Was the action properly annulled? Was it a goal against Cristian Lema or not? After reviewing several television images, the feeling is that the entire ball does not cross the goal line when Chiquito Romero hits it and clears it.
River scored a goal but it did not get on the scoreboard
After the game, Martín Demichelis went to the referee’s locker room. At a press conference, the coach explained: “I never spoke about the referees and I will never speak. I went because at the end of the game some of the boys approached him. I wanted to rest assured that they hadn’t said anything ugly, anything bad. And if something had happened, I wanted him to know how to understand the emotions of a game ending like that. “I went so that I could stay calm and apologize if I had to.”
Did Demichelis protest to the judge about that disallowed goal? The River coach’s response was surprising: “I don’t know… I didn’t even see it,” he only said in reference to the controversial play.
Sergio Romero did not see River’s goal
In Boca they swore it wasn’t a goal. In the mixed zone, a journalist showed Sergio Romero an image of the play and asked him what he saw. Chiquito responded: “I see that the final part of the ball needs to enter. He couldn’t get in. The important thing is that technology is often used well. Maybe the best thing would be for the referee to have the clock, so that he can tell him instantly if the ball went in or not.”
Romero was also asked why he did not go to complain to the referee in that situation that triggered the debate. And the goalkeeper replied: “Because the play was so extreme that not even I could tell my teammates at the time if the ball had gone in or not.” Marcos Rojo, on the same topic, assured: “Chiquito did well. I was close and saw that the ball had not gone in. That’s why he was very calm. He only asked the referee to go see him.”
