Las Palmas 1-4 Barcelona, 5 Talking Points: La Liga 2016/17
Barcelona registered a 4-1 win over Las Palmas at Estadio Gran Canaria to keep their slim hopes of winning the La Liga title alive. Neymar scored a wonderful hat-trick and was able helped by Luis Suarez, who also got on the scoresheet, to help Luis Enrique’s side maintain their position at the top of the table. Pedro Bigas scored the consolation goal for Quique Setién’s side.
Here are the 5 talking points from the game:
Lucas Digne is a lucky man!
The clock read 6 minutes when former Real Madrid forward Jese made a run down the left flank and get the better of Lucas Digne to be through on goal. The Spaniard was bearing down on goal, cutting in from the left and had no Barcelona players ahead of him. It was at this time that Digne, in a moment of poor desperation tugged the shirt of the forward and brought him down.
Let’s examine the situation first. Jese was through on goal, with no Barcelona players level or ahead of him making Digne the last man. The Frenchman denied the forward a clear goalscoring chance. Under all conditions, the referee should have given Digne, who was filling in at right-back, his marching orders, instead he only showed the 23-year-old a yellow card. Bizarre!
The controversial decision by the referee infuriated the Las Palmas players who clearly felt they were cheated. The home side were the better team for the first 20 minutes of the game before Suarez and Neymar scored within minutes of one another to squash the hopes of Setien’s side. It could have been a different game and a different result altogether had the referee, José Luis González, shown Digne the red card and forced Barcelona to compete for the majority of the game with a numerical disadvantage. Who knows, the title race could have been over yesterday only?