Video | Martínez Quarta's bizarre dismissal v Blooming after 3 mins | OneFootball

The long-awaited return of River Plate to the Copa Sudamericana after 11 years away got off to the worst possible start. On their visit to Bolivia to face Blooming, Eduardo Coudet’s team suffered an unexpected blow just moments into the match with the sending-off of one of its defensive pillars: Lucas Martínez Quarta.

A bucket of cold water

The clock had barely reached the 3-minute mark when a long ball from Blooming’s half caught River’s back line off guard. Forward Bayron Garcés got the better of “Chino” for position and, just as he was about to go one-on-one with Franco Armani, the former Fiorentina defender brought him down to stop a clear goal-scoring chance.

VAR intervention

Although referee Andrés Rojas Noguera had initially called a previous offside, the VAR review changed the course of the match:

The center back, who returned to the club in this transfer window, left the field visibly stunned by the decision and by how early he was sent off, leaving his team with ten men for almost the entire match at altitude.

Faced with this situation, the coach had to reshuffle quickly, bringing on Germán Pezzella in an attempt to maintain defensive order in a debut that had turned uphill from the very start.

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