It was one of the many decisions on the day that left Victory players, fans and their coach in utter disbelief when Kristijan Dobras received a straight red card for his tackle on Cameron Devlin.
Dobras was sent marching in the 60th minute – just moments before he was intended to be substituted – for making contact to Devlin’s face with his foot.
Regardless of whether Dobras was shown a yellow or red card for the incident, his game would have come to a quick end following the yellow card he had received in the opening stages of the second half.
The main question is though, was the incident worthy of a red card?
Although he did not say much about it, Marco Kurz did say at the post-match press conference that he believed the red card was not an appropriate decision.
“I think it’s hard, for me I think it’s not a red card.
“Two reasons, because he played with the side and not this direction (referring to the studs pointing to the man) and he touched him when he went down,” Kurz said.
Kristijan Dobras sees red for the high leg.
Do you think it was worth it?
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Kurz seemed to have an opinion very similar to those watching, including that of Robbie Slater on Matchday Saturday, who said he believed the call was a complete error.
“It was a joke”
Robbie Slater was not shy in his opinion of the controversial red card giver to Kristijan Dobras.
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There was little time between the actual incident and the decision to send Dobras off, which left Kurz having to simply deal with the way the card was delivered.
“I was a little bit surprised that he got [it] really quick, the red card, but I have to respect it,” he said.
Even with the footage provided of the incident, VAR decided to not overrule the decision of referee Stephen Lucas and questionably did not acknowledge that Dobras initially did make contact with the ball and looked to have tried to pull away from the challenge.
Victory were lucky to not concede a goal from this point on, which potentially would have lost them the game, and instead managed with the ten-man team to hold onto the 0-0 draw despite the side receiving a further four yellow cards.
It was a game full of emotion, frustration and anger which saw a total of ten yellow cards handed out – seven of them to Victory players – so it can be understood where the irritation came from following the red-card.
Feature Image Credit: The Football Sack
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