Football was robbed on Valentine's Day.
Not by a masked thief in the Milanese night, but by a referee named Federico La Penna, under the roaring lights of San Siro, in front of 75,515 witnesses and millions more watching from their sofas. The Derby d'Italia — Inter vs. Juventus, the match that stops Italy, ended 3-2 in favour of Inter. The scoreline tells you nothing. The real story is a phantom foul, a theatrical dive, and a red card that should never have existed.
I'm writing this from Tirana, still shaking my head. I'm Gerd Dani — astronomer by training, wheelchair user by circumstance, and a man who's spent his life believing that systems, whether scientific or sporting, must be built on truth. What happened at San Siro on 14 February 2026 wasn't truth. It was a farce.
The 42nd Minute That Changed Everything
Let me set the scene. It's the 42nd minute. The score is level at 1-1 after Andrea Cambiaso — in one of football's cruellest ironies — had scored both an own goal and a proper goal . The match is alive, electric, the kind of Derby d'Italia that makes your pulse hammer against your ribs.
Pierre Kalulu, Juventus's French defender, is already on a yellow card — a first booking that La Gazzetta dello Sport itself called "excessive" . He moves toward Alessandro Bastoni, who's restarting an Inter attack. Kalulu sees the danger, pulls back his foot. There's clear distance between the two players.
There is no contact.
Bastoni goes down like he's been hit by a cannonball. La Penna doesn't hesitate — second yellow, red card, off you go. Kalulu stands there, mouth open, repeating "no, no, no, I didn't touch him" . He makes the VAR gesture with his hands, desperate, not realising in the heat of the moment that the rules don't allow video review for a second yellow card .
And behind him — behind the distraught, incredulous Kalulu — Bastoni celebrates .
That image will haunt Italian football for years.
What the Experts Said
This isn't my opinion alone. Every refereeing expert who analysed the footage reached the same verdict.
Luca Marelli, DAZN's official refereeing consultant, was blunt: "It is a very serious error from La Penna. There was no contact between Kalulu and Bastoni". Graziano Cesari, former referee and Sport Mediaset analyst, went further: "The second yellow card is non-existent. There is clear distance between the players. La Penna should have a clear view, but he gets it all wrong. It's a total howler".
Cesari added something that stings even more: "The referee's error also saves Bastoni from a second yellow card for simulation" . Think about that. Bastoni was already on a yellow. If La Penna had seen the dive for what it was, Bastoni would have been the one walking off, not Kalulu.
La Gazzetta gave La Penna a rating of 4 out of 10 . La Repubblica called the expulsion "insindacabilmente immeritata" — indisputably undeserved.
The VAR Trap
Here's where the system fails in a way that feels almost absurd — like discovering a black hole in your equations that you can't fix because the maths won't let you.
VAR can only intervene for direct red cards. A second yellow that leads to a sending-off? The technology sits there, useless, watching the same replays we all see, and does nothing. The protocol forbids it. Kalulu begged for the review. The VAR room knew the truth. And nobody could act.
I'm simplifying the technical rules here for clarity, but the core problem is straightforward: we have the technology to correct an obvious injustice, and the rulebook says "no, not this time." It's like having a telescope pointed at a supernova and being told you're not allowed to look through the eyepiece.
A rule change has already been approved for the future — starting with the World Cup in America this summer, VAR will be able to review second yellow cards. Too late for Kalulu. Too late for this match.
Juventus Played With Ten Men — And Nearly Won
What happened after the red card is almost as remarkable as the scandal itself.
Juventus manager Luciano Spalletti reorganised — first a 4-4-1, then a 5-3-1, with Weston McKennie pushed up as a makeshift striker . The Bianconeri defended with the ferocity of a team that knew they'd been wronged. They pressed Yann Sommer, they created chances, they refused to collapse.
Inter coach Cristian Chivu, to his credit, substituted Bastoni at half-time . He knew. Everyone in that stadium knew.
The second half was wild. Pio Esposito — Inter's young striker — headed in a superb goal from a Dimarco cross to make it 2-1 in the 76th minute, becoming Inter's second-youngest scorer in a Derby d'Italia after Mario Balotelli. Juventus, driven by a burning sense of injustice, equalised through a beautiful Manuel Locatelli strike in the 83rd minute .
For seven minutes, it felt like football's conscience had been restored.
Then Piotr Zielinski killed it. A left-footed shot from 16 metres in the 90th minute. 3-2. Game over .
The Fury After the Final Whistle
The Juventus hierarchy didn't hold back. Giorgio Chiellini, now a club director and still carrying the gravitas of a man who captained Italy to a European Championship, was volcanic: "You can't talk about football tonight. Something unacceptable happened. The level of officiating wasn't adequate for a match of this magnitude. We need to change, and change now" .
He aimed directly at Gianluca Rocchi, the head of Italian referees: "It's obvious — there's a group that isn't working. And someone needs to show their face. Today he wasn't even at the stadium" .
Damien Comolli, Juventus's CEO, spoke in English so the whole world would understand: "Embarrassing to see this, to see it broadcast worldwide. We've seen a sum of errors this season. And every time it happens again and again and again. It's very difficult to accept injustice like this" .
At half-time, Spalletti, Chiellini, and Comolli had confronted La Penna in the tunnel . The tension was palpable. This wasn't just post-match grumbling — this was an institution declaring war on a broken system.
Thirteen Errors and Counting
Here's the number that should alarm everyone who cares about Serie A: at least 13 serious refereeing errors have gone uncorrected by VAR this season, and we're only at matchday 25. Last season's total was 15 for the entire campaign. The crisis isn't coming — it's already here.
I spend my professional life studying systems. In physics, when your measurements keep producing wrong results, you don't blame the individual readings — you question the instrument. Italian refereeing isn't suffering from one bad night. It's suffering from a structural failure.
Bastoni's Shame
Let me say something about Alessandro Bastoni, because this matters.
Bastoni is a fine defender. He plays for the Italian national team. He's 27 years old and at the peak of his career. And on Saturday night, he chose to cheat. He chose to simulate a foul that didn't exist, and when his deception worked — when a fellow professional was unjustly expelled — he celebrated.
La Repubblica's Emanuele Gamba wrote it perfectly: "It's not worthy of a player of that level, and of the national team, to profit from a red card in that way and then boast about it".
Chivu pulled him at half-time. That substitution was an admission — quiet, tactical, but unmistakable.
Why This Matters Beyond Football
I know what you're thinking. "Gerd, you're an astronomer. Why are you this angry about a football match?"
Because fairness isn't a sport-specific value. It's a human one. I've spent my life in a wheelchair, fighting systems that weren't designed for people like me. I've had surgeries that went wrong, institutions that said "the rules don't allow us to help you," and moments where the protocol mattered more than the person. Sound familiar?
When Kalulu stood on that pitch, gesturing for VAR, begging for someone to look at the truth that was right there on the screen — I recognised that feeling. The helplessness of knowing you're right and watching the system shrug.
Never give up is the philosophy I've built my life around. Kalulu didn't give up either. Juventus didn't give up. They equalised with ten men. They fought until the 90th minute. The result went against them, but the fight didn't.
What Needs to Change
The fix is obvious and already approved: extend VAR review to second yellow cards. This change arrives at the 2026 World Cup . Serie A should implement it immediately, not wait for FIFA to go first.
Beyond the rules, there's a cultural problem. Simulation — diving — is a cancer in football. It rewards dishonesty. It punishes the honest. And when a player like Bastoni can dive, get an opponent sent off, celebrate the injustice, and face zero consequences... the message to every young footballer watching is devastating.
Rocchi needs to answer Chiellini's question. Where were you? Who's accountable? Thirteen errors in 25 matchdays isn't a blip — it's a pattern .
The Match Itself Deserved Better
Strip away the controversy, and this was a spectacular Derby d'Italia. Five goals. Cambiaso's tragicomic double — an own goal at one end, a predatory finish at the other. Esposito's soaring header. Locatelli's defiant equaliser. Zielinski's ice-cold winner.
75,515 people packed San Siro on a Saturday night. They deserved a match decided by skill, courage, and tactical intelligence. They got a match decided by a dive and a whistle.
Looking Forward
This incident will accelerate the VAR protocol reform — La Repubblica reports that the process is already underway . It will probably end La Penna's involvement in high-profile matches for a long time . And it will fuel a debate about refereeing standards in Italy that's been simmering all season.
The standings now show Inter at 61 points, 15 clear of Juventus in fourth . That gap isn't entirely La Penna's fault, of course. But Saturday's three points? Those were stolen in broad floodlight.
I'll leave you with this. In science, we have a principle: extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. In football, the evidence was right there — on every camera angle, on every replay, visible to every pair of eyes in the stadium and beyond. The only person who didn't see it was the one holding the whistle.
That's not football. That's a system begging to be fixed.
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