We’re not saying that Undiano Mallenco’s performance in Saturday’s game between Valencia and Barcelona was bad, but the national TV channel which covers La Liga spent an hour on Saturday night and another half an hour on Sunday going over all the decisions which the referee made! Most importantly probably was whether Luis Suárez interfered with play from an offside position when Messi scored the opener, and given that he jumped over the ball he probably did (Diego Alves thought so at least, and he got booked for pointing that out!). Then it was whether Mario Suárez and / or Busquets should have been sent off, whether Enzo Pérez should have been shown a red card as well, or at least a yellow, for a tackle which has taken Iniesta out for three months, whether Messi should have had a penalty. and whether the penalty that Undiano did award to Luis Suárez was correct or not...

After Messi scored the winner from that spot kick there were ugly scenes when the inflamed crowd threw objects at the celebrating Barça players, and at least two of them (Neymar and Luis Suárez in particular) were felled with one small half filled plastic water bottle (although they could have been hit by other things?)! The lad who threw it has been identified and has apologized, although he did say how surprised he was that his action resulted in so many players going down! Rather than condemn the violence as he usually does though, LFP president Javier Tebas (a self-confessed Real Madrid supporter) has piled more wood on the fire by saying that Neymar and Suárez should be punished for play-acting, to which he got an angry response from the Catalan club.

Valencia themselves complained bitterly about the referee’s decisions, and sporting director Jesús García Pitarch said that the club were thinking of denouncing Neymar as well for inciting the crowd. García’s comments about the officials though have incurred the wrath of the Referees Technical Committee, and they said that they will be denouncing him, as well Las Palmas coach Quique Setién for his remarks about Jaime Latre. Setién was unhappy about both goals which Villarreal scored against the Canary Islanders, the first from a more than dubious penalty, and the second after Bakambu clearly dragged back Roque before running on to score. That’s Spanish football folks! (26.10.16)

PS See "Villains" section for further developments.

Name Games played Yellow cards Red cards Total
Del Cerro Grande 5 36 6 42
Martínez Munuera 6 39 3 42
Gil Manzano 6 38 2 40
Estrada Fernández 5 31 1 32
Iglesias Villanueva 5 30 1 31
Clos Gómez 5 28 2 30
González González 5 27 2 29
Hernández Hernández 5 25 3 28
Alvarez Izquierdo 4 23 3 26
Fernández Borbolán 4 25 1 26