Barcelona may request Real replay if VAR is found wrong to disallow Yamal goal: Laporta

BARCELONA: Barcelona may request a full replay of Sunday’s 3-2 LaLiga loss at Real Madrid if Lamine Yamal’s 28th-minute attempt to score, deemed not a goal after a VAR review, is confirmed to be a goal, club president Joan Laporta said.

The club will request all footage and audio of the incident from the Spanish Football Federation, Laporta said on Monday. The match was paused for several minutes as the VAR tried to determine whether Yamal’a effort had crossed the goal line, but it could not find a clear camera angle and the decision not to award a goal stood.

“If... the club understands that an error was made in the revision of the incident, we will take all available measure to reverse the situation, without discounting, obviously, any necessary legal action,” Laporta said.

“If it is confirmed that it was a legal goal, we will move ahead and we do not discount requesting that the game be replayed, just as has happened in another game in Europe due to a VAR error.” A Belgian Pro League match between Anderlecht and Genk, originally played in December, was scheduled to be replayed in full due to a VAR error, after the Disciplinary Council for Professional Football ruled in favour of a Genk appeal.

Laporta said he was dissatisfied with “improper use” of VAR, adding the tool was creating “confusions with contradictory criteria according to matches and teams.” “We understand the difficulty faced by officials, but it’s for that reason that such tools exist (like VAR) which should help the competition be fairer and not the other way around,” he said. Barcelona, with 70 points after 32 matches, trail leaders Real by 11 points.