Palermo Coach Roberto Stellone said Frosinone made the play-off “a brawl, urban warfare and the referee was not up to the task.”
The ill-tempered, controversial and at times shameful Serie B promotion play-off final at the Stadio Benito Stirpe last night continues to drag on.
Palermo Coach Roberto Stellone said Frosinone made the play-off “a brawl, urban warfare and the referee was not up to the task.”
The ill-tempered, controversial and at times shameful Serie B promotion play-off final at the Stadio Benito Stirpe last night continues to drag on.
The ugliest incident in stoppages saw Frosinone players from the bench throw spare footballs on to the field in order to break up Palermo attacks and halt play.
“It was a non-game,” Stellone told La Repubblica. “Frosinone based the whole thing on a brawl, urban warfare and the referee was not up to the task, as he proved with the penalty.”
The referee at first awarded a free kick to the Sicilians on the edge of the box, then changed his mind by pointing to the spot, only to return to his original decision moments later.
There is no VAR in Serie B, so the officials were unable to check all these situations using video evidence.
“At the end of the game, I spoke to the referee, and he told me that he made a mistake pointing towards the spot. It was a lie, because if you point by mistake the first time, the second means you’ve thought about it and the third means you reconsidered.
“He was surrounded by five or six Frosinone players, some of whom were already booked, and a strong decision then would’ve changed the game.
“The fact of the matter is that after that, he was capable of sending Dawidowicz off from the bench after Nestorovski was headbutted and the penalty incident.
“I’ve never seen anything like it before. There is great bitterness and I couldn’t have asked the lads for anything more.”
Stellone is in a strange position, because he was the Coach when Frosinone earned their first ever promotion into Serie A, yet he was up against them this time.
“When Frosinone were in the lead, they tried absolutely every trick in the book to bring it home. I won’t say I understand their behaviour, because it was unsporting, but what disappoints me is that we didn’t get a chance to play the game.
“After that penalty incident, there was no more football. We all saw what happened.”