Conversation between referee, VAR over penalty incident from Barcelona vs Real Madrid leaked: “Accidental, never a pen”

The referees and VAR have been under the spotlight in La Liga over the past week after the controversies that went down during the game between Real Madrid and UD Almeria last weekend.

As many as three dubious decisions were made in favour of Los Blancos during that game at the Santiago Bernabeu, sparking the fury of Almeria players and manager.

Barcelona have not been quiet on the matter either with both Xavi Hernandez and Joan Laporta calling out their arch-rivals for pressuring referees through the Real Madrid TV videos.

With all the controversy going on, Gerard Romero had leaked an audio recording of the discussion between the referee and VAR during the Real Madrid-Almeria clash.

El Clasico recording leaked

Now, Romero has gotten his hands on another audio recording of discussions between the referee and the VAR from the first El Clasico of the season between Barcelona and Real Madrid in La Liga.

The game was played back in October last year at Estadi Olimpic Lluis Companys, which Real Madrid ended up winning 2-1.

During the match, there were one or two suspicious decisions made by the match official, one of which was Barcelona being denied a clear penalty after Aurelien Tchouameni had put his arm around Ronald Araujo inside the box.

The recording that Romero has leaked now reveals the conversation between the referee and the VAR regarding the incident.

Araujo was fouled by Tchouameni in the box during Real Madrid’s 2-1 win over Barcelona. (Photo by FREDERIC J. BROWN/AFP via Getty Images)

Even though they acknowledge that Tchouameni had gotten his arm around Araujo, they believe that it was not worth a penalty, dismissing the incident as ‘accidental’.

“He puts his hand over him, of course, but there is never a penalty. There’s nothing, he grabs him and jumps up… Accidental.”

“He kind of puts his hand on him and pushes him back, but it’s not a penalty.”

If it was not clear before, the game against Almeria made it fairly obvious that there may be some favourable treatment being handed to Real Madrid by officials.

It has been reported that if there were no VAR errors made this season, Barcelona would be above Real Madrid in the league table. But as things stand, Xavi’s men are third in the standings, eight points below leaders Girona and seven behind Los Blancos.