Berlin: The video assistant referee (VAR) has made a controversial start to the new Bundesliga season in Germany which left Hoffenheim coach Julian Nagelsmann fuming.
The VAR worked well at the World Cup in Russia, but added to its blighted reputation in Germany during Bayern Munich’s 3-1 win over Hoffenheim on Friday.
With the scores at 1-1 late in the opening league game of the season, Nagelsmann was incensed when Bayern were awarded a penalty after Franck Ribery went down in the area following a Havard Nordtveit tackle.
Replays showed Bayern’s French winger jumped over Nordtveit and no contact was made, but the VAR failed to intervene after referee Bastian Dankert awarded the penalty.
“Why the build-up to the penalty was not checked is a mystery to me,” scolded Nagelsmann, 31, who will leave Hoffenheim at the end of the season to coach RB Leipzig.
“Football is a contact sport and if the player is blocked, but there is no contact, then it is not a foul — it’s marginal.
“Where were the video assistants?”
Robert Lewandowski took the resulting penalty, but when his shot was saved, Arjen Robben tapped home the rebound.
However, the penalty had to be retaken as the VAR spotted that the Dutchman entered the area too early and Lewandowski finally converted the spot kick on 82 minutes.
Robben then added a third goal in added time as defending champions Bayern made a winning start in their bid to claim a seventh straight league title.
“There was a stupid period of video watching,” fumed Nagelsmann, who will make his Champions League debut with Hoffenheim this season.
He said: “You don’t need to have 14 screens in Cologne,” where the VAR is based for Bundesliga matches. “Put on extra screens in the stadium. It would cost less and we don’t always have this switching back and forth.”
France winger Kingsley Coman, meanwhile, will be sidelined for several weeks after tearing ligaments in his left ankle for the second time this year during Munich’s win.
Bayern have confirmed that the 22-year-old will undergo surgery after suffering a fresh injury in a foul during the first half of Friday’s 3-1 home victory against Hoffenheim.
Bayern expect him to be out for “several weeks”. Coman has suffered the same injury that sidelined him from February to May, an absence which cost him a place in France’s World Cup-winning squad.
It is a bitterly disappointing setback for Coman, who impressed Bayern’s new coach Niko Kovac enough to win a place in the starting line-up ahead of Arjen Robben.
“It’s bitter news and obviously hurt a lot — I was shocked,” said Bayern defender Joshua Kimmich, who was near Coman when he was fouled by Hoffenheim’s Nico Schulz.
