By admin 
Atletico Madrid boss Diego Simeone said he “wanted to believe” the VAR saw Julian Alvarez touch the ball twice in last night’s dramatic penalty shoot-out defeat to Real Madrid in the Champions League.
Alvarez was deemed to have kicked the ball on to his standing foot and the spot-kick was ruled out, although it wasn’t immediately clear from the replays.
A closer look at THAT penalty from Julián Alvarez 😱 pic.twitter.com/HdyUQ0TeOE
— Football on TNT Sports (@footballontnt) March 13, 2025
With Marcos Llorente also missing for Atletico, as well as Lucas Vazquez for Madrid, it was left to Antonio Rudiger to squeeze the winning penalty past Jan Oblak to send Carlo Ancelotti’s men through to a quarter-final meeting with Arsenal.
Simeone questions decision
It was Alvarez’s penalty that dominated the post-match conversation and Simeone was not convinced it was the right call.
“I’ve just seen the images, the referee says Julián touches the ball with his supporting leg, but the ball doesn’t move,” he said. “That’s debatable, whether it was a goal or not. But I’m proud of my players, I’m honestly happy, because we competed in an exemplary way.
“When Julián kicks [the penalty], the ball doesn’t even move a bit. I imagine that they called the VAR and saw that he touched it. I want to believe that they’ll have seen that he touched it.”
Atleti won 1-0 on the night thanks to Conor Gallagher’s goal in the opening minute but were unable to find a second during a game high in energy but low in quality.
“Are you afraid because you’re going to be punished?” 🤐
Diego Simeone reacts to Julian Alvarez drama after Atletico Madrid’s Champions League exit.
🎥 UEFA2025 pic.twitter.com/2sNDlksUZe
— Sky Sports News (@SkySportsNews) March 13, 2025
Madrid goalkeeper Thibaut Courtois thought the right decision had been made regarding Alvarez’s spot-kick and both he and his team-mates were quick to make their point to on-field referee Szymon Marciniak.
“I felt that he touched the ball twice and I told the referee,” the Belgian said. “It’s not easy to see that.”
He was unimpressed, however, by Simeone questioning the integrity of the VAR.
“For UEFA, it’s clear. I’m sick of this victimhood, always crying about things like this. Referees don’t want to benefit one team or another in Spain or in Europe, for them it was clear. With the technology, in the VAR room they saw it clearly, they have a lot of cameras and a lot of images.”