It is not necessary to see a game like the one on Sunday night at the Coliseum Alfonso Pérez to know what it looked like, who dedicated himself to playing and who to destroy. Just look at the statistics to get an idea: of the 116 minutes that Getafe-Barça (0-0) lasted, more than half the time the game was stopped, 60.43 minutes (52%); that is, an hour without the ball in motion. With the icing on the final addition, in which only 5.25 of the 15.25 minutes were played.
If we add to this the distribution of fouls (only those indicated), 20 by Getafe to 11 by Barça, plus the cards (8 yellow for Getafe, 2 for Barça; and two red for each side), and possession of the ball ( 25%-75%), the X-ray is explicit about what happened.
It was a reissue of the rough matches that Barça has had against Mourinho's teams (Inter, Madrid) or José Bordalás, a faithful disciple of the most repugnant style of Mourinismo – bad arts, interruptions, fouls, hard play bordering on violence, provocations. Result: Barça was not able to score a single goal in 116 minutes of play. Nor in the three previous visits to the Coliseum (0-0, 0-0, 1-0). The last victory in Getafe dates back to September 2019 with Valverde (0-2).
The Geta anti-soccer player ended up imposing his goal, with the connivance of Soto Grado's permissive arbitration: he stopped the person who proposed to play, drove the rival mad, took a point from him, and caused two expulsions, that of Raphinha -who took justice by his forearm (to Gastón's face, who moments before had hit him in the face) -, and that of the coach, Xavi Hernández, who warmed up with the fourth referee "ostensibly protesting with his arms raised" -according to the record–
Both face several games of sanction, and the coach, in addition, to the opening of a disciplinary file by the RFEF Integrity Committee for his forceful statements against Getafe's game, the performance of Soto Grado, the arbitration criteria and the own league.
The intentional intervention of the Terrassa coach at the end of the game was more than justified: his team suffered an outrage, manifested in the referee's tolerance of the rival's fouls (“he has allowed them that game, the limits are set by him and he has allowed us to lose our heads"), the penalty not called on Araújo due to Gavi's supposed previous handball (“the hand is invented, there is none anywhere” –he pointed out, using the invented term, like Carlo Ancelotti last year against Girona, without receiving a Competition sanction–), and the disparity of arbitration criteria, both with the hand (“they said that if they were not clear they would not whistle them, and they have whistled it; everything happens backwards”) and with added time and the time lost during the match.
Xavi explained that before starting the season –last Thursday– the coaches had a meeting with the referees. "They told us that they were going to understand the coaches more, that we are tense, and that is not what happened today."
At that briefing, they went over the new rules and asked for their help to avoid wasting time. The reason? The Spanish League is the leader in losing time in Europe (53 minutes and 36 seconds was played on average last year) and for this reason there is an increase in injury time: 30 seconds per substitution, 1 minute for medical assistance, 1 minute per goal , and the loss of time, which is replaced at the referee's decision.
Xavi Hernández remembered what they were told and loaded his rifle: “The added time [25 minutes in total] is another shame. Effective time and it's over with all this. We are being ridiculous. It is normal that people do not want to watch football, because this has not been practically a game, ”complained the Terrassa coach, pointing directly to the League and Javier Tebas. "If we sell the Liga product and what we have is this, it is not positive for anyone."
In that chapter, the blaugrana ended up very upset; anger that was added to that of Getafe's harshness and Soto Grado's permissiveness with anti-soccer. “The referees and LaLiga have to mark a line. It's not Getafe's fault, they compete like that. It's his way. Nine added minutes at the end [were 15.25] seems like a lot but they lost like 25 or 30 in the second half. It's a shame," Frenkie de Jong complained.
