Barcelona should have been awarded a penalty, admits Mallorca manager

Mallorca became only the second team to take points off Barcelona in the 2023/24 La Liga season as they held the reigning champions to a 2-2 draw on Tuesday.

Javier Aguirre’s side took the lead early in the game through Vedat Muriqi, but Barcelona equalised thanks to Raphinha’s goal. Just before half-time, though, Mallorca were in front again with Abdon Prats scoring.

Barcelona came back again, though, equalising through youngster Fermin Lopez, who scored his first goal for the senior team and salvaged a point.

During the game, though, there was a contentious moment when Barcelona thought they had won a penalty after a foul on Lamine Yamal by Jose Manuel Copete.

But after consultation with the VAR, the referee decided not to award the spot kick, something that did not sit well with the Catalans.

Manager Xavi Hernandez spoke after the game and claimed that his side should have been given the penalty and his Mallorca counterpart, Javier Aguirre, agreed.

Indeed, the Mallorca manager admitted that Barça should have been awarded the penalty by the referee for the foul on Yamal, as he said (h/t Mundo Deportivo):

“As my friend Medina Cantalejo would say, it’s a penalty. He does touch it, but the boy is already going to dive. It’s tough being a referee, I get tricked by my players in training.”

This is not the first time that Barcelona have been hard done by referees this season, having had penalties waved off in earlier matches as well.

But the important thing for Xavi & co. is that they came away with a point and did not suffer their first loss of the campaign and are still atop the La Liga table.