After the Superclásico row, River will ask AFA to drop Héctor Paletta | OneFootball

River’s leadership will submit a request to the Argentine Football Association asking that Héctor Paletta, the VAR referee in the latest Superclásico, not officiate them again. The club believes they were harmed by the official in the final play of the match, since he did not call Darío Herrera over to review a shove by Lautaro Blanco on Lucas Martínez Quarta.

The final minute of the match was the most controversial moment of a Superclásico that, until then, had been calm in that regard. Darío Herrera believed that Blanco’s off-the-ball shove on Martínez Quarta had not been forceful enough to knock him down and that it was River’s own captain who exaggerated the action in search of a penalty that would have given them a chance to equalize.

Héctor Paletta, in Ezeiza, upheld the on-field referee’s decision and did not call him to review the play. Once the match ended, several River players went to complain to the official. Martínez Quarta, the player involved in the play, told him: «He doesn’t let me play the ball, it’s a penalty. I’m surprised by you, especially since you’re going to the World Cup».

Later, in the mixed zone, he explained the play to TyC Sports microphones: «Blanco has no intention of playing the ball. He goes straight to crash into me and I’ve got my back turned. I can’t go after it. Everyone saw it. VAR should have called him over. I don’t know whether the comments from the week, when they came out and spoke, may have influenced something. I want to believe in good faith and that it wasn’t like that. I respect Herrera, and mistakes are human.”

According to what this outlet learned in recent hours, Fernando Rapallini, Technical Refereeing Manager and former Argentine football referee, believed that Héctor Paletta acted correctly from the VAR booth, since he had no better tools than those available to Herrera on the field. In his view, that assessment by the referee is supported by the images that have been replayed since the end of the Superclásico.

At the same time, Federico Beligoy, Secretary of the Argentine Referees Association and the person in charge of appointments, went even further and praised Herrera for his performance. The National Director of Refereeing rated the Superclásico referee’s performance at «8 or 9 out of 10».

At River, the anger continues and, after having submitted the request to the AFA, they are awaiting a response that will be given in the coming hours.

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