Out of the shadow

Up to the task

The second leg of the Bayern-Liverpool encounter is certainly a main-stay for every football enthusiast, thus the importabce of being given the handling of this game. And ir t was a thrilling one, starting somewhat hesitatingly on both sides but the longer they played the better it got. Orsato proved he was up to it. His best attribute which was also a great gift to players and spectators, was his ability to apply the advantage rule sensibly - more than once he waited for a few seconds, watched the developments and either let the play flow or pulled players back if the attempt at advantage didn't yeald fruit. Referees will always make mistakes, and there is no reason to pick on them when the overall performance is that good. However one kind of mistake demonstrates the "Italian false interpretation" of "deliberate hand-ball" (Orsato's main "contribution" to this interpretation had already been demonstrated in Nigeria vs Argentina at WC2018 when he acted as VAR - luckily Cakir turned down his recommendation to award a penalty-kick). In the 41st minute a Bayern player's header hit Firmino's hand who was positioned about two metres from the Bayern player. The Liverpool player had certainly no time to consider and react. Alas the referee was commited to the Italian interpretation and awarded a free-kick to the German team.Between the two ars, the more experienced on the international stage (Manganelli) was better than his counterpart (Preti). However, the latter one was right to stick to the new instructions under VAR when he let Levandovski get on, though he was in a clear offside position (and it was obviouus Preti detected it correctly), till he missed the goal, and then raised his flag