UEFA officially explain the decision to controversially rule out Atlético Madrid striker Julián Alvarez's penalty after he had scored..

UEFA had released a statement to explain the referee's decision to controversially rule out Atlético Madrid's Argentina international striker Julián Alvarez's penalty after he had scored during the club's UEFA Champions League penalty shootout against Real Madrid on its official website on Thursday.

According to UEFA's official statement, in compliance with Atlético Madrid's request, they have consulted the referee on duty and quickly launched an investigation.

After consulting the VAR assistant referee, the referee unanimously found that Alvarez accidentally slipped when taking the penalty, thus before he scored the penalty, his other foot, which was used to support his whole body and not used for shooting, had also touched the ball.

Since Law 14.1 of the Games Rules of the International Football Association Board (IFAB) stipulates that any player who touches the ball more than once before shooting the ball when scoring a penalty is considered a foul, the VAR assistant referee can only follow the principle of this Law and urge the referee to rule out Alvarez's penalty.

However, since Alvarez obviously slipped when taking the penalty and had no intention of willingly committing a foul, UEFA will use Alvarez's incident as an example to discuss with FIFA and IFAB whether to handle similar incidents with caution and consider whether players who accidentally slipped and touched the ball once before shooting should really be considered a foul in the future.

Atlético Madrid defeated their city rivals Real Madrid 1-0 in the second leg of the 2024/25 UEFA Champions League Round of 16s match at the Estadio Metropolitano on Wednesday, thanks to England international midfielder Connor Gallagher's lightning quick goal shortly after the start of the game. However, since the two sides are tied at 2-2 in terms of aggregate score, the game could only enter a penalty shootout after the end of extra rtime.

When it came to the second penalty, when Alvarez took the penalty with his right foot, he did accidentally slip and his left toe had touched the ball once.

Although the former Manchester City striker did score the penalty, the referee soon ruled out the goal after being reminded by the VAR assistant referee. In the end, with Antonio Rüdiger's penalty ended up in the back of the net, Real Madrid won 4-2 in the penalty shootout and advanced to the quarter-finals.