Two of our Men-In-Black, Velasco Carballo and Undiano Mallenco, have been called up for a pre-World Cup seminar, and we wish them all the best in their quest to make it to Brazil. Undiano was the only one in action this weekend in the match between Zaragoza and Real Madrid, and apart from turning down a possible penalty claim by Postiga when Essien held him back, he had a fairly quiet night.
The main controversies elsewhere also concerned penalty decisions, with for example Celta's Park and Barça's Messi both believing that Mateu Lahoz should have pointed to the spot, and there were similar appeals in other games. Iglesias Villanueva was the only referee to give one though, for a foul by Málaga's Willy Caballero on Rayo's Tito. It's all part of football!
José Antonio Teixeira Vitienes is currently topping our chart however, and he made a curious observation in his report after the match between Betis and Getafe. Teixeira mentioned that he asked officials to remove a poster which he saw in the crowd which read "Villar (i.e. federation president) + Referees = Ali Baba and the 40 thieves!" Presumably that was because it was factually incorrect - there are only 20 of them! (03.04.13)
Name | Games played | Yellow cards | Red cards | Total |
Teixeira Vitienes, J.A. | 19 | 137 | 12 | 149 |
Teixeira Vitienes, F. | 21 | 123 | 13 | 136 |
Pérez Lasa | 19 | 120 | 14 | 134 |
Muñiz Fernández | 17 | 119 | 13 | 132 |
Clos Gómez | 22 | 118 | 14 | 132 |
Pérez Montero | 20 | 116 | 10 | 126 |
Alvarez Izquierdo | 16 | 110 | 8 | 118 |
Hernández Hernández | 18 | 107 | 10 | 117 |
Velasco Carballo | 20 | 110 | 7 | 117 |
Gil Manzano | 17 | 110 | 5 | 115 |