Barca benefits the most from La Liga from VAR

According to the current situation, Barca is firmly at the top of La Liga with 68 points, 12 points more than Real, when the tournament has 12 rounds left. But without VAR, the two teams would have 61 points together, but Real lead thanks to the sub-status.

In the El Clasico match in round 26 of La Liga on March 19, VAR denied Marco Asensio's goal for offside, causing Real to lose 1-2 to Barca and lose a point. After the match, coach Carlo Ancelotti expressed doubts about the VAR's offside identification lines and suggested that La Liga apply semi-automatic offside catch technology like the 2022 World Cup.

Real dropped the remaining four points, divided equally between the two matches against Girona in October 2022 and Betis on March 6. In the match against Girona, Real opened the scoring thanks to Vinicius' cushion in the 70th minute. Five minutes later, receiving advice from VAR and directly going to the touchline to review the video, the referee awarded Girona a penalty and Christian Stuani gave the penalty. set the score 1-1.

In a 0-0 draw at Betis two weeks ago, Real hit the net with a free kick from Karim Benzema in the 12th minute. But after going to the touchline to watch the slow motion, referee Cesar Soto determined the ball was gone. touched Real's defender Antonio Rudiger standing near the fence, before going into the net.

In the match against Valencia in the 12th round of La Liga on the evening of October 29, Barca won 1-0 thanks to a goal in the third minute of injury time by Robert Lewandowski. Before that, at the beginning of the second half, from the right cross, Samuel Lino pressed Alejandro Balde's face and then crossed the corner, opposite the direction of Marc-Andre ter Stegen's movement. However, after going to the touchline to review the video, referee Ricardo De Burgos denied the goal when he judged that a Valencia player had touched his hand earlier. Thus, VAR helps Barca win two more points in this match.

On March 12, VAR made two favorable decisions to help Barca win 1-0 at Bilbao. At the end of the first half, Raphinha received the ball from Sergio Busquets and then shot diagonally into the home net. The line referee initially raised the flag for offside, but VAR then stepped in and recognized the goal for Barca.

Controversy broke out in the 87th minute, Inaki Williams picked up a teammate's slot, rushed into Barca's penalty area and then shot Ter Stegen diagonally. He and his teammates celebrated excitedly, thinking that they had regained a point for Bilbao. But after going to the touchline to review the video, referee Jesus Gil denied the goal when he determined that his replacement Iker Muniain had let the ball touch his hand in a dispute with Frenkie De Jong earlier.

Without VAR, Barca would have lost this match 0-1, instead of winning 1-0. After the match, Bilbao coach Ernesto Valverde was dissatisfied with the referee's decision and emphasized that "this is not football". "It's hard when you can't see anything on the field and someone else does it with a telescope," he added.