Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City was considered favourites against Olympique Lyonnais to progress to the Champions League semi-finals. Guardiola hasn’t won the European competition since his Barcelona days.
City was out of contention of the Premier League too soon this season and it was seen as a sign that Guardiola would focus everything on this season’s Champions League.
Once again, Guardiola has failed in his attempt as Lyon produced a surprising result by beating City 3-1 and setting up a Champions League date with Bayern Munich.
3 – Since progressing from his first seven Champions League quarter-finals as a manager with Barcelona and FC Bayern München, Pep Guardiola has been eliminated in each of his three appearances at this stage of the competition with Man City (17-18, 18-19 & 19-20). Crushing. #UCL pic.twitter.com/szeEW7qLWG
— OptaJoe (@OptaJoe) August 15, 2020
But the biggest question of the night is that whether VAR has robbed Manchester City of a Champions League semi-final place?
Cornet scored a brilliant tight angle goal in the first half but De Bruyne scored the equaliser at the start of the second half to make it 1-1. City was on top and it seemed they were going to take the lead but then the most controversial moment of the match happened.
In the build-up to Lyon’s second goal, Moussa Dembele fouled Aymeric Laporte and he went on to score the goal. The VAR checked the goal and surprisingly allowed the goal to stand.
Dembele clearly made contact and tripped Laporte. Although it was unintentional, these type of fouls in the penalty box has even seen penalties been given. But why did VAR not give a foul this time?
It clearly seems VAR has robbed Manchester City of a chance to progress to the semi-finals. City was on top and if that goal was disallowed City would have continued their rise and most probably win the match. But that incident turned the match upside down.
After that, Sterling missed an open goal to make it 2-2 and Ederson made a mistake too. He saved a shot and pushed the ball towards Dembele who scored the winner and made it 3-1 and it was clearly game over for Guardiola’s side.
Guardiola said about the incident: “It happened many times in this competition but I don’t want to talk about anything now because it will be like we are finding excuses as a club. It is what it is.”.
But the question remains why is VAR so inconsistent? These type of fouls are given all the time but in such a crucial match at an important moment, VAR overlooks it completely. City should surely feel robbed by VAR.
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