{"id":48751,"date":"2026-04-15T18:19:57","date_gmt":"2026-04-15T12:49:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/?p=48751"},"modified":"2026-04-15T18:20:16","modified_gmt":"2026-04-15T12:50:16","slug":"barcelona-president-joan-laporta-announces-new-uefa-complaint-over-referee-and-var-decisions-after-first-protest-deemed-inadmissible","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/football\/champions-league\/barcelona-president-joan-laporta-announces-new-uefa-complaint-over-referee-and-var-decisions-after-first-protest-deemed-inadmissible\/","title":{"rendered":"Barcelona President Joan Laporta announces new UEFA complaint over referee and VAR decisions after first protest deemed \u201cInadmissible\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"<p dir=\"auto\">FC Barcelona president <strong>Joan Laporta<\/strong> has confirmed that the club will submit a <strong>new formal complaint<\/strong> to UEFA regarding controversial referee and <strong>VAR<\/strong> decisions in their UEFA Champions League quarter-final tie against Atl\u00e9tico Madrid.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"auto\">Speaking after Barcelona\u2019s elimination from the competition, Laporta expressed strong dissatisfaction with the officiating across both legs and revealed that the club refuses to accept UEFA\u2019s recent dismissal of their previous protest.<\/p>\n<h3 dir=\"auto\">Laporta: \u201cWe Can NOT Accept This\u201d<\/h3>\n<p dir=\"auto\">\u201cWe already did a complaint to UEFA and I believe we will do another one,\u201d Laporta stated. \u201cWe can NOT accept this.\u201d<\/p>\n<p dir=\"auto\">The first complaint, filed after the <strong>first leg<\/strong> (played on April 8, 2026), focused primarily on a clear handball inside the penalty area by Atl\u00e9tico defender Marc Pubill that was not penalized, despite VAR review. UEFA\u2019s Control, Ethics and Disciplinary Body declared that initial protest <strong>\u201cinadmissible\u201d<\/strong> on April 13, 2026.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"auto\">Laporta and the club maintain that the refereeing errors \u2014 including the missed handball, along with other disputed decisions in the second leg \u2014 had a direct impact on the tie\u2019s outcome and Barcelona\u2019s exit from the Champions League.<\/p>\n<h3 dir=\"auto\">Context of the Refereeing Controversy<\/h3>\n<p dir=\"auto\">Barcelona\u2019s frustration stems from multiple incidents during the quarter-final:<\/p>\n<ul dir=\"auto\">\n<li><strong>First leg (Barcelona 0-2 Atl\u00e9tico Madrid)<\/strong>: A blatant handball by Pubill in the box went unpunished. Referee Istvan Kovacs and the VAR team allowed play to continue, sparking immediate outrage from Hansi Flick and the Bar\u00e7a players.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Second leg<\/strong>: Further controversial calls, including a red card to Eric Garc\u00eda, a disallowed goal for Ferran Torres, and an unawarded penalty on Dani Olmo, added to the club\u2019s grievances.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p dir=\"auto\">Laporta had previously described the officiating as \u201cunacceptable\u201d and rejected any claims of favorable treatment toward Barcelona, calling such suggestions \u201cshameless.\u201d<\/p>\n<p dir=\"auto\">The club\u2019s legal team is now preparing a second formal submission to UEFA, demanding greater accountability, transparency in VAR decisions, and recognition of the errors that affected the match.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>FC Barcelona president Joan Laporta has confirmed that the club will submit a new formal complaint to UEFA regarding controversial\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":502,"featured_media":48753,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4652],"tags":[661,4057],"class_list":["post-48751","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-champions-league","tag-barcelona","tag-top-stories"],"reading_time":"2 min read","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48751","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/502"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=48751"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48751\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":48761,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48751\/revisions\/48761"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/48753"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=48751"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=48751"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.businessupturn.com\/sports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=48751"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}