Torino coach Juric rages at ‘scandalous’ VAR and referee

Torino coach Ivan Juric was furious at the ‘scandalous’ decision not to give a penalty in the final moments of their 1-1 draw with Monza and reassured his player who burst into tears.

The Granata had taken the lead at the U-Power Stadium this evening when Ivan Ilic turned in the Duvan Zapata cut-back from the by-line, cancelled out by Andrea Colpani pouncing on an error from teenage substitute Gvidas Gineitis.

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It was because of that mistake that at the final whistle 19-year-old Gineitis burst into tears and had to be consoled by his teammates and the coach.

“These things happen to everyone, it was his only mistake of the match and everything else was perfect,” Juric told Sky Sport Italia.

“He is a very emotional kid, but this error will help him mature and learn for the future.”

The coach was pretty emotional himself when watching the footage of the stoppage-time incident in the Monza penalty area, as Valentin Lazaro appeared to have his ankle clipped.

As he did not go down, instead trying to stay on his feet, the referee and VAR perhaps did not feel inclined to take a second look.

“I don’t know what the rules say about that, but frankly it’s scandalous. In the era of VAR, that is a clear penalty. It’s the second time this happened with Monza, we had another situation last season, so over two games we’ve had four points taken off us by VAR. Evidently we are not very lucky with Monza.”

Torino have turned their season around lately with back-to-back Serie A wins over Lecce and Sassuolo, then this draw away to Monza.

Juric was also involved in a tense row with fans last week when he appeared to ‘flip the bird’ at some of them, but had a meeting with the ultras to clear the air.

“Torino is a club with very demanding fans. On the one hand that is good, but on the other it creates some pretty big expectations.”