Pep Guardiola says he believes the right decision was made when Jude Bellginham was adjudged to have fouled Ederson before rolling the ball into an empty net.
The Dortmund man latched on to a loose touch from the City goalkeeper, knocking the ball away as Ederson attempted to clear.
There was understandable backlash surrounding the decision, made worse by the fact that VAR couldn’t overturn the referee’s original decision as he had blown before the teenager was able to tap the ball in.
Bellingham was booked for his protestations and replays clearly showed him getting to the ball before Ederson.
However, Pep Guardiola claimed afterwards that the decision was a correct one, due to the height of the midfielder’s boot.
Gutted. https://t.co/RpXcEpP2AH
— Jude Bellingham (@BellinghamJude) April 6, 2021
Guardiola touched on the decision when he was asked about the bizarre scenes in which one of the officials appeared to follow Erling Haaland down the tunnel and ask for an autograph.
He shrugged off that request, though did highlight that the officials were “brilliant”.
“I didn’t see it but maybe he’s a fan of Haaland and he’s here, so why not?” Guardiola said of the linesman.
“The referees were brilliant. The game was not a problem. It was a penalty but the people saw the VAR and it was not a penalty.”
? "He's a fan, he's a fan from Haaland so why not?"
— Football Daily (@footballdaily) April 7, 2021
Pep Guardiola says he has no problem with the assistant referee asking Borussia Dortmund striker Erling Haaland for an autograph pic.twitter.com/aJ9CiEy654
“After the Bellingham action the leg is higher than expected, so the referee and linesmen were correct, perfect. They did a good job. That’s all. Nothing happened.”
We have to imagine there will be a fair few people who would argue otherwise…
Featured image credit: Getty
