Chievo Boss Curses Luck After Penalty Farce
Monday 28th January 2002
Chievo boss Luigi Del Neri was furious with the referee for awarding Juventus two contentious penalties as his side lost more ground in the title race.
"I am really angry," said Del Neri after the 3-1 defeat at the Bentegodi stadium.
"The first decision was simply ridiculous. I saw it very clearly, but I don't want to say too much on the matter. For the second one, our player may have touched the ball with his hand, but that was only after Pavel Nedved gave him a shove.
"I believe that a penalty should only be awarded if there is a clear infringement. That was not the case in either instance," insisted the Chievo coach.
Alessandro del Piero earned Juventus their first penalty shortly after half-time when he was adjudged to have been fouled by Chievo goalkeeper Christiano Lupatelli, but the Italy forward saw his tame shot comfortably saved.
Del Piero admitted he was embarrassed that the referee had given a penalty in the first place. "It was never a foul," he said. "Did I miss the penalty on purpose? That would be a convenient excuse, but the truth is that I just didn't hit it properly."
The defeat leaves Chievo ten points behind leaders Roma with a game in hand, but Del Neri claimed that his players had not let their standards drop.
"I told them after the game that I thought they had done really well," he explained. "We're not in a crisis, we're just lacking a bit of luck.
"I think that, despite the penalty decisions, Juventus deserved to win," he admitted. "But we shouldn't lose track of where we are. This time last year we were battling to get out of Serie B the situation is quite different now."
Juventus are now in third place, just three points off the top, after completing a double over the Verona side.
Their first win over Chievo came courtesy of another controversial last-minute penalty, but coach Marcello Lippi was keen to deflect attention away from the officials.
"When we won 3-2 at the Stadio Delle Alpi earlier in the season, everyone was talking about the penalty that we got in the last minute, but nobody mentioned that David Trezeguet had a perfectly good goal disallowed before that," he declared.
"Referees make mistakes, but we have to accept their decisions. We are playing with more confidence now and that is encouraging. It's been an up and down campaign for us so far, but I think we're finding our consistency," added the Juventus boss.
