Former referee Graziano Cesari has said that the decision made to send Fikayo Tomori off during AC Milan’s defeat to Chelsea was ‘incomprehensible’.
Speaking during an interview with Sport Mediaset (via SempreMilan.it), the former international referee and current commentator shared his anger at the decision made on Tuesday night to send Tomori off and award a penalty in the first half.
The referee decided that Tomori had pulled Mason Mount down in the box which was worthy of a penalty. The giving of a penalty meant that he also had to send the defender off. VAR did not overturn the surprising decision.
Asked about whether the right call was made at San Siro in Milan’s 2-0 defeat, Cesari said: “Incomprehensible decision. The intensity of Tomori’s touch is not such as to cause a penalty kick. The referee says Tomori held him back, but that is wrong!”
He want on to say that the referee only deserves a rating of 3/10 and then claimed that is for getting to and from the match and wearing the right clothing.
“VAR cannot judge the intensity of the contact. At the first simple touch from Tomori he was already going to whistle. There was no penalty. Rating for the referee: 3. For the outward journey, for the return journey and because he dressed as a referee.”
Milan felt that they could have had a penalty too, on which Cesari said: “When a player is disinterested in the ball and goes on the opponent… if you judge Tomori’s holding of the arm as a penalty and expulsion, there was also a yellow on Sterling who even put his arms on Bennacer’s neck.”
Problem is, even if the ref hadn’t given it, VAR would have looked at it and the result would have been the same, penalty and red card..
Not true. A bad ref will mark a fault. Most likely the game was already deside it, that Chelsea to win. That would have been a great no call. James fault Theo twice in de same play 1st showing the studs, 2nd stepping on him & no card but gabbia got one on his 1st fault. That made me wonder about it. If the game was already decided before it even started.