Hoeneß on the referee

“The worst performance I’ve ever seen!”

Uli Hoeneß(Bild: APA/Tobias Hase)

Even during the match, the clash between Bayer Leverkusen and FC Bayern Munich had sparked plenty of controversy, and after the final whistle, the commotion only intensified—thanks to Uli Hoeneß’s scathing criticism of the referees! “That was the worst performance by a refereeing team I’ve ever seen in a Bundesliga match,” said the Bayern boss, making no secret of his dismay with Christian Dingert and his crew…

No question: From the perspective of those rooting for FC Bayern, Saturday afternoon must indeed have been very frustrating. The red cards shown to two players and the disallowed goals likely got under many people’s skin…

Above all, the yellow-red card for Bayern star Luis Díaz following an alleged dive in the Leverkusen penalty area caused quite a stir. For one thing, the Colombian had actually been lightly touched by goalkeeper Janis Blaswich, and for another, he hadn’t made the slightest move to claim a penalty.

“That’s not a dive in a million years!”
Bayern captain Joshua Kimmich was downright outraged in his post-match interview with DAZN: “I don’t want to argue for a penalty, but that is absolutely not a dive!” His coach Vincent Kompany agreed: “No one in the stadium knows why he got the red card—it’s madness!”

And the VAR? It couldn’t intervene because the rules don’t allow for its use in cases of yellow-red cards. A bitter pill for FC Bayern, because after reviewing the TV footage following the match, even referee Dingert admitted: “If I see the footage now, I wouldn’t call it that way anymore!”