Full marks for originality to referee Lopez, we thought we had seen every aspect of bad officiating in Santa Cruz but he sunk even lower. A phantom penalty at the start of the second half handed a 0-1 victory to Girona and it wasn’t even his finest moment. CD Tenerife were again below par, giving a rare start to Aday was intended to warm up an extra player with the hoped for play off campaign ahead but he was a passenger and with Rigo in for the suspended Bruno there were big cracks to be exploited.
Rock bottom Girona deserved their win for sheer determination, it was ugly and disturbing to watch but how we would have loved that spirit when we dropped two divisions. The referee should have kept their worst qualities in check but he was at best not up to the job, maybe he got stung by a jellyfish on a former Tenerife holiday, now he was stinging us.
Juanlu on his return to Santa Cruz gave Roberto an early tickle with a slow curling shot but Isaac eclipsed him in the other goal by turning aside an Ayoze strike after he had controlled the ball and turned to fire. Timor went down easily after a tackle in the home box, after some hesitation the ref booked him for the dive. It had the makings of a decent game, Timor had another go, this time from the edge of the box, it brought another assured gather from Roberto.
The 13,035 crowd were pumped up after arriving early, and singing homage to former hero Rommel Fernandez after nine minutes to match his old shirt number. Aridane had his controls set to snooze leaving Ayoze to work extra hard and Suso was well marked and kept under control. On the half hour Ayoze Perez took the ball deep and with a determined run beat the defence only to shoot wide. Girona were a strong side but couldn’t resist the urge to hit the deck anytime a Tenerife player was near them, the ref seemed blind to this. Maybe a rethink was needed at half time in the home dressing room, Tato could have burst through if not for the excellent work of Ayoze Diaz and Timor tried again but even with a crowd of players part shielding his shot, Roberto was there to greet it.
The scorching seats had only just been re-filled when the ref produced his trump card. Juanlu fired in a cross from the left byline and the ref pointed to the spot claiming a deliberate hand ball by Moyano. The touch if any was slight and Moyano was unable to avoid it, Jandro scored and that’s when Girona’s tactics got really ugly. A routine tackle by Carlos Ruiz on Tato saw the Girona player squirming on the ground and calling for a stretcher, it arrived, he got up, and Ruiz got booked. From then on that became the norm, I saw the stretcher so many times I thought I was watching Casualty, and of course every time the stretcher went back unused. After the first few times I thought the ref would warn them but the farce just continued.
Changes were needed to try to get some home rhythm going, Juanjo replaced Aday and Rivero took over from Sanz but it didn’t work, only Ricardo was doing any good in midfield. Rivero did manage a low shot that hardly troubled the Girona keeper but the cutting edge wasn’t there especially after the ref booked Ayoze. Richy got close to Ayoze and took the dive, out came the yellow card and the distraught striker was in disbelief as he realized he would miss the Las Palmas game for totting up a fifth card. It could have got quite nasty, Suso was getting more and more frustrated, he hit out at a corner flag after his goal was ruled out for offside, and then squared up to Richy when he turned his attention to the flying winger.
Edgar was the last throw of the dice, replacing Ayoze Diaz but he couldn’t turn the game around. Suso sent a late shot just past the post as we braced ourselves for a long period of injury time from the stretcher parade. Somehow the ref could only find four minutes of extra time and even cut that a little short. With Las Palmas winning at Zaragoza it turns next Saturday’s derby game on its head. Maybe a second appeal will get Ayoze’s booking cancelled but it’s going to be a tough 9pm game in Pio land.