At the worst moment of the arbitration, a protest brought greater confusion

Refereeing in Argentine football is going through a very bad time. Many dare to say that it is the worst in its history. Weekend after weekend we see rude rulings by the judges that harm different teams in all the categories that the competition includes. Argentine Football Association (AFA). Even in the Professional League, in which the VAR – it was assumed – had arrived to avoid such injustices.

Can they be wrong? Of course. In the same way that a goalkeeper misses a goal that seems to have been made. They are humans. However, some errors are so treacherous that they lead fans to stop believing in those who dispense justice. And, far from providing transparency, this Friday a protest took place that brings greater confusion. There was a call for referees from the Referees Union of the Argentine Republic (GYPSUM) at the door of the AFA headquarters on Viamonte Street and, under the motto “Firm, free and honest”, They questioned the moment that the referendum is going through under the leadership Federico Beligoy.

The protest, specifically, is against the AFA as an institution and, in particular, against Claudio Tapia y Pablo Toviggino, president and treasurer of the mother house of Argentine football. They point out that in 2018, shortly after Tapia assumed the position left vacant by Armando Pérez, Beligoy was appointed as National Director of Arbitration, who at the same time serves as Secretary General of the Argentine Association of Arbitrators (AAA), which is one of the two union institutions (the other is SADRA, precisely) that were part of the AFA College of Referees for the appointment of referees.

“Their functions are clearly incompatible. Beligoy is judge and party. They sought, in this way, to remove SADRA from the map and manipulate some judges to favor teams related to power and harm others. How? They forced SADRA members to resign under the argument that if they belonged to this union they would no longer lead, which constitutes true labor extortion,” he told Clarín. Norberto Wollkopf, one of the strong names in the guild led by Guillermo Marconi.

From AFA, meanwhile, they argue that those who began to be left out of the designations were simply because they did not meet some of the necessary requirements to direct a professional match, such as, for example, being physically fit. It is the word of one against that of the other.

In Viamonte there were flags of the sections of different provinces: Tucumán, Mendoza, Córdoba, San Luis, Corrientes, Chaco, Jujuy, La Rioja, Rosario, Mar del Plata, Pergamino, La Pampa, Misiones, Catamarca, La Rioja, Formosa, Entre Ríos, Chubut and the City of Buenos Aires.

The ten arbitrators who won the trial for “employment discrimination” to the AFA, which generated a cost of 210 million pesos to the treasury of the football entity between compensation, fines, costs and fees, among other administrative expenses. These are Ariel Montero, Maximiliano Salado Paz, Martín Grasso, Sebastián Ranciglio, Angel Ayala, Darío Rojas Martínez, Federico Cuello, Laureano Leiva, Martín Saccone and Leandro Núñez. The case of Esteban Nasier and Marcelo Arredondo is still pending.

In this context, due to the obligation of Justice after those trials that were favorable to SADRA, the AFA complies with appointing each referee for a minimum of two games, which is what the guarantee establishes. But, anyway, the conflict continues.