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As expected, the day after the Clasico in which Barcelona beat Real Madrid 4-3 people were focusing on two things: The performance of referee Alberto Undiano Mallenco, creating the appropriate memes and jokes for it, while also praising Lionel Messi for his performance, which cast a pretty heavy shadow on a disappointing and complaining Cristiano Ronaldo.
Because Ronaldo forgot about his penalty in the second half – the one which Dani Alves tripped him outside the box, and Ronaldo dove as he usually does. Ronaldo talked about how the referee wanted Barcelona to win, about how everyone wants Barcelona to be in the championship race.
Yes, Neymar made a meal of a soft touch by Sergio Ramos, but a foul is a foul, and Ramos didn’t do much complaining. Xabi Alonso tripped Andres Iniesta in the box, and there’s no way around it. People want referees to call what they see, but when they actually do exactly that, the losing teams complain for obvious reasons. There was also a penalty kick Barcelona deserved in the first half after Pepe tripped Neymar, but everyone forgot about that.
The day after wasn’t all about referees. Lionel Messi scoring a hat trick and setting up the Iniesta goal once again propelled him into the ‘best in the world’ status, especially when compared to tha pale performance from Cristiano Ronaldo. He did score a goal from the penalty spot, but did nothing else to help out his team.
As Xavi answered to Ronaldo through the media: Barcelona were simply better, before the red card and after. Not by much, but by enough. It doesn’t mean that a wonderful match of football can’t be made fun of later on with some fantastic jokes and memes.