A recent Liverpool win in the Champions League has been labelled the “death of football” by a former player, with Inter Milan still lamenting the “injustice” of the Reds’ 1-0 win.
Having lost their previous Champions League match 4-1 to PSV, Liverpool went to San Siro without Mo Salah but managed to scrape a 1-0 win thanks to a late Dominik Szoboszlai penalty.
Though Liverpool kept Inter at bay for much of the match, the hosts felt they were deserving of a point.
Former Inter and Italy goalkeeper Emiliano Viviano went a step further, highly criticising the decision to award a dubious penalty for Alessandro Bastoni’s pull on Florian Wirtz‘s shirt.
He said on TV Play (via Inter News): “That stuff is the death of football.
“Even a top referee I asked told me that this is madness, not a penalty. The insults? I don’t care at all.
“The Liverpool players and manager were struggling to answer questions about this penalty. It goes back to my battle with logic; the players are stuck in their positions, one has his back turned. Even if he pulls his shirt, it’s not a penalty for me.
“And I would have said the same if it had been called on an Italian team, even Fiorentina (Viviano’s team). Even if Alessandro Bastoni is naive, that’s never a penalty.”
In truth, it was a harsh decision as Wirtz could have stayed on his feet, but Liverpool will feel they deserved a spot of luck given they were unfortunate to concede a penalty themselves, away at Galatasaray, which also led to a 1-0 loss.
Ibrahima Konate also had a goal ruled out at San Siro, earlier in the match, that arguably should have stood.
Striker Lautaro Martinez rued the result, saying at the Gazetta Sport Awards: “We’re disappointed but not angry, because if you lose because of a referee’s mistake, there’s little you can do.
“We’re sorry we threw everything away because of an injustice. If penalties were awarded for every holding foul, the game would never be played.”
On CBS, defender Manuel Akanji, who is on loan from Man City, also disputed the referee’s call: “The penalty situation, I mean he pulls his shirt but it’s a soft pull and obviously if you watch everything in slow motion, everything looks far worse than it actually is.
“The player runs away from the goal and he pulls his shirt a bit and it’s one of the softest penalties I’ve ever seen.”
Finally, Inter player and former Man United attacking midfielder Henrikh Mkhitaryan added: “It hurts to lose a match like this, when you fight for 85 minutes and a penalty like that is awarded, but we have to move on.
“It’s hard to accept, but we need to keep our heads up, work harder, and try to change things in the next two matches.
“Tonight wasn’t our best performance, but we shouldn’t forget that we were up against a top-level opponent. It was a balanced game and, in my opinion, a draw would have been fair, but the referee decided to award a penalty for what felt like a dive.”
While Inter weren’t outplayed on the night, they barely threatened a potentially vulnerable Reds defence and created only one big chance at home, according to FotMob.
On the night, they produced just 0.44 xG and managed just two shots on target to Liverpool’s five. This was hardly a performance that warranted much more than a point at best.