Sunday’s mega encounter in Serie A between Juventus and Inter Milan was full of drama, with the referee attracting unavoidable scrutiny following Juve’s 1-0 defeat to the Italian champions.
As initially expected, the unravelling of the latest edition of Derby d’Italia on Sunday lured some inevitable criticism, with the referee-in-charge, Massimiliano Irrati, being at the centre of several controversies. Now, the Italian press have given their verdict on Irrati’s performance in what could prove to be a season-defining game for both Juventus and Inter.
According to La Gazzetta dello Sport, Irrati deserves the rating of 6 out of 10. The Italian daily believes that the referee got most of his decisions correct. And with the help of Paolo Mazzoleni as VAR, he handled the controversial moments astutely in what was considered a “rough match”.
As per The Corriere dello Sport, Irrati deserves 4.5 out of 10. While giving the reason for such a low rating, the outlet pens that the referee should have not allowed the retake of the penalty. As per the report, it should have been a foul against Inter after the initial attempt by Hakan Çalhanoğlu was saved by Wojciech Szczęsny.
On the same matter, La Gazzetta dello Sport writes that Irrati was right as Matthijs de Ligt had already made an early entry into the penalty before Çalhanoğlu had struck the penalty kick. Doing anything else would have been unfair.
However, Tuttosport have taken a middle ground here, giving Irrati a rating of 5 out of 10. But they have not fallen short while calling Irrati decisions inaccurate. They accept that Alvaro Morata’s stamp on Denzel Dumfries was never a foul. And as such, that should not have been a penalty in the first place.
As done by La Gazzetta dello Sport as well, Tuttosport also put their focus on the second-half incident involving Bastoni and Zakaria. Tuttosport deem the incident as a penalty to Juventus as the foot of Zakaria was inside the penalty area. In reality, Irrati didn’t give the decision in the Bianconeri’s favour after being involved in a ‘silent-check’ with Mazzoleni.
