AC Milan drew 2-2 in an entertaining game against Salernitana last night, and the officiating crew did not attract much criticism for their performance.
La Gazzetta dello Sport (via MilanLive) have praised the performance of Fabbri and his assistants, starting with the opening goal in which Messias was in so much space that many presumed the flag would go up, but he was kept onside by the Fazio-Ranieri pairing.
There was also nothing wrong with the home side’s equaliser as Maignan was unable to clear a ball up to Djuric and Bonazzoli netted despite Theo Hernandez’s miraculous save attempt on the goal line.
There was no penalty when Rafael Leao appealed for one just before the goal that made it 1-1, as his cross was blocked by Mazzocchi and the first impression is that it could be a hand ball, but the replays show it hit his thigh.
However, there are major doubt instead about an incident in the 43rd minute as Messias claimed a penalty. A Leao cross came in and the Brazilian was beaten to it by Sepe’s interception, but he was having his shirt pulled by Ranieri.
Fabbri and the VAR crew seem to have evaluated the incident as not worthy of a penalty, but some doubts remain for an intervention as obvious as it is foolish.
I can’t remember the last time Milan had a poor result and there wasn’t a follow up article somehow blaming the referee.
Salernitana played a great game, they matched a tired Milan in areas and took their chances whilst Milan missed several.
No-one at ‘fault’, move on to the next one.
After Milan – Spezia it was definitely the referee. Even the referee said it was the referee. With those three points we would be clear on top.