The bitter cry of a referee and the loving reaction of a coach in trouble

He couldn’t contain himself. When your countryman Maurizio Mariani declared the end of the game, Alessandro Giallatini He began to cry bitterly. This Italian assistant referee (49 years old) knew that he had just experienced his last match from the sideline, and showed his emotion to the world.

It was this Tuesday, on the sixth day of the Champions Leagueafter the victory (2-3) of the surprising Aston Villa of Unai Emery in the stadium Leipzig. The German team has not added a single point during the initial phase of the new format of the top European football competition, a circumstance that gives more value to its coach’s gesture. Marco Rose.

Thus, the German coach realized the anguish that overwhelmed Giallatini and, forgetting his own sporting regrets, came to console him. “It was his last game, so he was very excited,” the empathetic Rose later explained in the press room.

In fact, Giallatini closed a long history of performances, more than 300, in World Cup, Euro Cup, Nations League, Champions, Europa League and of course Series A (League) of Italy. Among the most notable and remembered appointments, he was part of the arbitration trio chaired by the well-known Daniele Orsato in the final of the Champions League of the year of the pandemic (2020) played by Bayern Munich and Paris Saint Germain.