• Champions League

City-Barcelona ref to take charge in Munich

ESPN staff
April 7, 2014
Jonas Eriksson was heavily criticised by Manuel Pellegrini after Manchester City's loss to Barcelona © Getty Images
Enlarge

Jonas Eriksson, the referee who suffered the wrath of Manchester City boss Manuel Pellegrini in the Champions League, will take charge of Manchester United's quarter-final second leg at Bayern Munich on Wednesday, UEFA has confirmed.

A furious Pellegrini accused Eriksson, a Swedish official, of being biased and influencing the game as City lost 2-0 to Barcelona in their last-16 first-leg tie at the Etihad Stadium on February 18. Eriksson had sent off Martin Demichelis and controversially awarded a penalty, which Lionel Messi converted to open the scoring.

Evra: We can take leaf out of Chelsea's book

  • Manchester United travel to the Allianz Arena on the back of last week's 1-1 draw, but defender Patrice Evra believes they can emulate Chelsea's epic Champions League final victory over the Bavarians in order to salvage their season.
  • Click to read the full article here

Following his side's defeat in Manchester, Pellegrini said: "The referee did not have any control of the game. He decided for Barcelona from the beginning to the end. I think it was not a good idea to put a referee from Sweden in such an important match and a referee who made a mistake against Barcelona in the group stages."

Pellegrini's rant attracted criticism from Barca players and FIFA refereeing chief Jim Boyce, before the Chilean later apologised to Eriksson, UEFA and the people of Sweden for his comments.

However, UEFA decided to charge Pellegrini with misconduct and, as a result, he was suspended for three UEFA competition matches, one of which was suspended for two years.

Eriksson has previous experience of officiating a big European tie involving Bayern; the Swede was in charge of the 2013 UEFA Super Cup final between the Bundesliga side and Chelsea, which took place in Prague and saw Ramires red carded for a challenge on Mario Gotze.

In January, Eriksson was confirmed as one of the 25 referees picked by FIFA to officiate at this summer's World Cup in Brazil.

Jonas Eriksson sent off Chelsea's Ramires in their 2013 UEFA Super Cup loss to Bayern Munich © Getty Images
Enlarge
© ESPN Sports Media Ltd
ESPN staff Close

ABOUT COOKIES

To help make this website better, to improve and personalize your experience and for advertising purposes, are you happy to accept cookies and other technologies.

More Info Here Cookie Choices