Due to a little-known football rule, Emiliano Martinez was spared a red card in Aston Villa’s match against LOSC Lille on Thursday night. However, the team is aware that Martinez will miss the first leg of the semi-final due to suspension.
The World Cup winner proved to be the Villans’ hero at Stade Pierre-Mauroy, saving two penalties in a penalty shootout that tied the score at three points overall after Lille’s 2-1 victory. The second-leg tie was tense throughout, which wasn’t helped by the uncooperative refereeing of referee Ivan Kruzliak. Martinez, France’s most notorious public opponent, couldn’t resist stirring up the crowd.
After receiving a booking in the first half for persistently wasting time, Villa’s custodian was quite vulnerable for the majority of the match. He did indeed take a chance during regulation time, but he did so much more in the shootout when he silenced the Lille supporters by stopping Nabil Bentaleb’s penalty.
Martinez’s finishing move caused referee Steve Kruzliak to act a second time, as the Argentine was given another yellow card. A farewell, then? Of course? However, Martinez was reassured by a rule that he was unaware of.
Warnings and cautions given during the match are not carried over into kicks from the penalty mark (KFPM), as per IFAB law 10 (determining the outcome of a match). Thus, “a player who receives a yellow card during both the match and the KFPM is not sent off,” according to the official rules.
Martinez’s antics, fair or unfair as they were, might not get away with it too lightly, though, since Villa is aware that three yellow cards in the quarterfinal’s two legs entail a ban for the first leg of the following round.
This is where things become murky since UEFA regulations specify otherwise. The peculiar circumstances surrounding Martinez may override the suggestion made in Article 52 of the regulations that “all yellow cards expire on completion of the quarter-finals.”
To be clear, the cards of any players who were one card away from being banned have been reset. However, Martinez’s punishment is said to carry over because he was given the two during and up to the conclusion of the second leg of the quarterfinal and a yellow in the first leg. The club feels that way, and The Telegraph has confirmed this as well.
Sure, it’s confusing, but Unai Emery will have to settle for playing without his first-choice shot-blocker.
