The Conmebol He acknowledged on Wednesday that The VAR was wrong in not reviewing the referee’s decision of field in relation to a “reckless” contact of Colombian Daniel Muñoz on Vinícius Júnior inside of the area.
The play took place in the 42nd minute of the match between Brazil and Colombia (1-1), when the Canarinha won 1-0 against the Colombian team, at the end of Group D of the America Cup from the United States.
Muñoz stopped Vinícius from running into the box, but Venezuelan referee Jesús Valenzuela saw no foul and ordered play to continue.
“He touches the ball,” Valenzuela said in the audio recordings released this Wednesday by Conmebol, organizing confederation of the Copa America.
The VAR, captained by Argentine Mauro Vigliano, then came into action.
“I need to see if he touches the ball. I want to see if he changes the direction of the ball (…) If he pinches the ball, right? Yes,” the VAR voice indicated.
“Jesus (Valenzuela), very tight, you can resume. He pinches the ball when he lowers his foot and gives it momentum, then contact is made”he added, addressing the field referee.
However, Conmebol analyzed the incident and described it as follows: “In a dispute for the ball inside the areaa defender does not touch the ball and as a result of the dispute, reckless contact occurs for action. The referee fails to observe the action and lets play continue.”
The entity pointed out that the VAR, in a protocolary manner, began to analyze the play “with different angles, speeds and considerations, and was unable to identify that the defender did not touch the ball before recklessly contacting the Brazilian forward.”
“In view of this, VAR incorrectly confirms the original on-field decision”, admitted the South American Football Confederation (Conmebol).
This is the audio from the VAR released by Conmebol. Here they acknowledge that the penalty on Vinicius was omitted. The unusual thing is that Vigliano from the VAR says that Muñoz touched the ball. The serious thing is not not seeing what happened but seeing what did not happen! It was a clear penalty for Brazil! pic.twitter.com/As4O21TZI8
— Juan Furlanich 🇦🇷🇻🇪 (@Jfurlanich) July 3, 2024
The decision on the play was harshly criticized by the Brazilian coach, Dorival Juniorat the end of the match, which ended in a draw (1-1), since shortly after the penalty not awarded to Vini, Daniel Muñoz himself would equalize the score.
“The referee was decisive. Inside the stadium, only he and the VAR did not see a penalty.which certainly existed. Brazil was greatly disadvantaged,” the coach criticised.
In his opinion, that penalty could have changed the course of the match, because Canarinha would have had the chance to go 2-0 up and seal the win on the counterattack.
The coach also did not think that the warning that Vinícius received shortly after the start of the match for leaving his arm on James Rodríguez near the area was correct, and that will keep him out of the quarter-final match against Uruguay due to an accumulation of cards.
“Everything that happened is very strange,” he said.
*With information from EFE.
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