Iturralde González analyses Benfica v Nacional, spots two howlers | OneFootball

Iturralde González analyzed Benfica’s victory over Nacional (2-0) and pointed out two blatant mistakes by Fábio Veríssimo. The highly respected former Spanish referee argues that the penalty awarded in Benfica’s favor was not clear and that the goal disallowed for the island side was wrongly judged.

"What referees must be asked for is consistency, meaning they should call the same thing in similar situations. If they give a penalty here because Léo Santos uses his body and ends up bringing down Schjelderup, then the first play is more of a penalty, because there is a clearer push from behind than in this one," the Spanish official began by explaining, in comments to Record newspaper.

"To me, the incident involving Fresneda looks more like a penalty. Here, the Nacional defender uses his body and it is a battle for the ball in which he already has his foot on the ground, and it is the Benfica forward, with his left leg, who hits the defender’s leg. Either both are called or neither… I wouldn’t have called either of them," Iturralde González admitted.

"Zé Vítor puts his hands on Pavlidis’ back, but when the Benfica player feels contact, he goes down and throws himself to the ground. For me, there is nothing there, no foul. The player goes down and deceives the referee. There is no arm movement, there is no clear push," concluded the former man in the middle.

It should be remembered that Benfica returned to winning ways in the league after the damaging draw for the Eagles’ ambitions against Casa Pia. The Eagles, led by José Mourinho, settled the match against Nacional in just 14 minutes, with goals from Andreas Schjelderup (3') and Rafa Silva (14'). The Greek missed a penalty, which could have made it 3-0 for Glorioso.

This article was translated into English by Artificial Intelligence. You can read the original version in 🇵🇹 here.