Lisandro Martinez has made the headlines after his moment of madness in Crystal Palace 0-0 Manchester United on Saturday.
The Argentina international bizarrely leapt off the ground when going in to challenge Daichi Kamada for the ball, planting both feet firmly on the ground and narrowly missing the Japan international’s foot by a matter of inches.
It was the very essence of endangering an opponent – so why did the Manchester United No.6 not receive a red card against Crystal Palace? Let’s take a look…
Premier League Match Centre explain Lisandro Martinez situation
The Premier League have an official account on X (previously known as Twitter) called the Match Centre – designed to clear up any confusion over significant decisions – and they have explained why the South American was not sent off.
After the 63rd minute moment, they posted: “The referee issued a yellow card to Martinez for a challenge on Kamada. VAR checked for a potential red card and confirmed the referee’s call of no red card, deeming this was a reckless challenge and made no contact with Kamada.”
We cannot quite understand how the Premier League agree it was a “reckless challenge” – but still felt that no red card was merited – especially when you look at the official FA rulebook.
Under Law 12 – Fouls and Misconduct – the following paragraph can be seen when explaining what constitutes a red card.
“Playing in a dangerous manner is any action that, while trying to play the ball, threatens injury to someone (including the player themself) and includes preventing a nearby opponent from playing the ball for fear of injury.”
Martinez certainly acted “in a dangerous manner” – so we really don’t understand how David Coote and also those in the VAR booth did not overturn the original decision.
Crystal Palace were not good enough
Regardless of whether Martinez was dismissed or not, Crystal Palace simply weren’t at the races against Manchester United – the opening 45 minutes particularly stank of a trademark Roy Hodgson performance, with no attacking intent whatsoever.
In fairness, Oliver Glasner tweaked his system and ignited a better display in the second half, with Ismaila Sarr impressing Crystal Palace fans with his performance after replacing Jean-Philippe Mateta at the interval.
Of course, there are a lot of new players in SE25 who still need to gel together, but as things stand, the Eagles are looking very unbalanced.
