Mats Hummels was still happy on Monday. “Good morning to the ‘finally Champions League again’ week,” he told his 2.1 million followers on X, formerly Twitter. The mood of the Borussia Dortmund defender suddenly deteriorated on Tuesday evening. BVB takes the first leg of the round of 16 of the Champions League 1-1 into the second game on March 13th in their own stadium and therefore still has every chance of reaching the quarter-finals.
Tobias Rabe
Editor in charge of Sport Online.
But the creation of the goal for Eindhoven, which destroyed Dortmund’s lead by former PSV player Donyell Malen (24th minute), infuriated not only Hummels. It was the 54th minute of the game when Hummels tried to tackle Malik Tillman in the penalty area. First he hit the ball, then slipped into the opponent, who fell. Referee Srdjan Jovanovic let the situation sink in for a few moments and then awarded a penalty for Eindhoven.
The Dortmund protests, led by Hummels, did not take long to arrive. But even after the video assistant checked the scene, the referee team stuck to the decision; Luuk de Jong scored from eleven meters (56th). “What a joke of a penalty against us. Again,” Hummels later wrote on
“Zero percent penalty for me”
Hummels alluded to controversial penalties that Borussia had whistled against them in the Champions League last year. In the second leg of the round of 16 last season, Marius Wolf had the ball crossed into his arm from close range. The following penalty goal decided the duel for Chelsea. In the group game at Paris St.-Germain this season, Niklas Süle received the ball in the arm during a shot. There were penalties again and Dortmund lost again.
Now a penalty caused big trouble for BVB again. Hummels had already made his clear opinion known on the TV broadcast. “Zero percent penalties for me. Tillman was laughing his head off on the pitch, they were all grinning at me for minutes,” he said on Prime Video. “Sorry, we’re in the Champions League. That was the second ridiculous penalty we conceded after the Paris game. I don’t understand the referees at the moment.”
Referee expert Wolfgang Stark had a different opinion. “For me the decision is correct. Mats Hummels plays the ball with his long leg, he also goes in with a high risk, but with his trailing leg he hits the striker, so the referee’s decision is in any case understandable and also correct that the VAR did not have to intervene here. But he also admitted that it was “a very tricky situation for the referee.”
Daniel Theweleit, Eindhoven Published/Updated: Recommendations: 2 Published/Updated: Recommendations: 5 Daniel Theweleit Published/Updated: Recommendations: 2
Stark’s explanation did not ease Hummels’ anger, on the contrary. “That is an explanation that can only come from the rule book and not from professional football. That’s zero penalties. We are on completely the wrong path. Unfortunately, I have the impression that the VAR has made the referees worse. In the meantime, they make a decision and then have it checked. It’s the round of 16. Then you have to expect the highest level from the referees.”
Great goal: Donyell Malen hits the ball under the crossbar. : Image: Reuters
Dortmund sports director Sebastian Kehl was also annoyed. “The anger is very great. When you have decisions like that against you that aren’t 100 percent correct, it hurts,” he said, accusing the Serbian referee of not watching the scene on the screen on the sidelines: “He knows how important it is of the game. In that situation he could have looked at it, maybe even should have.”
Coach Edin Terzic, like Hummels, struggled with the fact that from Dortmund’s point of view it wasn’t the first mistake in a crucial point. “This has been with us for a while. It’s the third time we’ve discussed the referee after a game in the knockout phase of the Champions League.” In addition to the penalty at Chelsea mentioned by Hummels, he alluded to a penalty for Manchester City in the 2021 quarter-finals when Emre Can died Headed the ball against his own arm.
With all the debate about the penalty, the rest of the action on the pitch was neglected. Because the flawed BVB didn’t play well and were lucky that Eindhoven didn’t take advantage of their own chances. And so, despite the controversial outcome, the result was still good news that Hummels and Co. took with them into the night. “We’ll sort out the rest in Dortmund,” said Terzic, looking ahead to the second leg in three weeks in their own stadium.