🎥 VAR audio out, Rocchi slams Napoli-Inter penalty, blames assistant⚠️ | OneFootball

The referee designator Gianluca Rocchi, in the usual appointment on DAZN Open VAR, analyzed several incidents from the weekend: from the penalty awarded in Napoli-Inter for the contact between Mkhitaryan and Di Lorenzo — then converted by Kevin De Bruyne — to the missed penalty in Lazio-Juve, up to the doubts about the legality of Leao's goal in Milan-Pisa.

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Rocchi's judgment is clear towards all his collaborators involved in Naples, particularly the assistant Bindoni: "The decision is not correct, for us it is not a penalty. What I did not like at all today - and I emphasize at all - was the interference in this case by Bindoni, who goes beyond what we asked him to do. This is not an episode where the assistant's interference is needed. We have asked the assistants to intervene on 100% clear things and in their area of competence. Certainly not in this area of competence here".

For the designator, the VAR should have intervened: why didn't it? Rocchi analyzes and tries to explain: "Apart from the fact of whether Di Lorenzo extends his leg to protect or not, because we don't know what he intends to do, the fact that there is contact and we shouldn't intervene is absolutely not something I like to hear. Because if there is contact, but it is slight, we intervene. We have said, as an intervention line, that we want: clear penalties; interventions to remove clear goals; a slightly lower threshold on serious fouls of play and violent conduct. That is, we must be very strict and interventionist from a disciplinary point of view, but we must also demand that the penalties that change the games have a high level".

Rocchi, finally, also analyzes the incident between Gila and Conceicao, an error that further characterized this horror weekend for referees: "The player seeks the opponent, there is a clear step on foot and we would have expected a VAR intervention and a consequent penalty".

Finally, there is also an opinion on the incidents in Milan-Pisa. On Leao's goal, there were some doubts about its legality: «We have worked to define how much offside affects the goalkeeper. It is a borderline situation, but from now on the criterion will be distance: the closer the offside player is to the goalkeeper, the more punishable it will be. In this case, the impact is there».

On Atekame's goal, however, «the position is more correct, because Fofana is further away». Rocchi then added: «De Winter's arm? It was right to award the penalty. Pisa's goal? The Moreo-Gabbia contact is accidental, there is no clear evidence of a foul».

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