New angle reignites debate over Rodri’s red-card challenge in Barcelona’s win over Valencia

Rodri’s challenge on Valencia forward Arnaut Danjuma has prompted fresh debate after new footage emerged from Barcelona’s 5-0 La Liga victory on Sunday, with the incident raising questions over whether the midfielder should have been sent off.

The disputed moment occurred inside Barcelona’s penalty area during the fourth round of the competition. The broadcast pictures initially offered only a limited view of the contact between Rodri and Danjuma, making it difficult to establish exactly how the collision unfolded.

However, the account “Archivo VAR”, which specialises in analysing refereeing decisions on the social media platform X, published what it described as new images showing the incident from another angle.

The account drew attention to the additional view and argued that Rodri moved towards Danjuma before the Valencia forward was able to complete his shot.

“Look closely at the new angle of the challenge between Rodri and Danjuma! The Spanish player launches himself at the forward before he takes the shot,” the account said.

It then gave its assessment of the decision that should have been made, adding: “The decision should be a penalty and a red card for Rodri.”

The account concluded that the images available during the live broadcast did not fully show the extent of the contact.

“With the angles shown by the broadcast, it was impossible to observe the magnitude of the contact,” it said.

The original post, published alongside the images, carried the same argument in Spanish:

“💥 ¡Ojo a la nueva toma de la accion entre Rodri y Danjuma!👉🏻 El jugador espanol se lanza contra el delantero antes de que ejecute el remate.❌ PENALTI Y ROJA.▪️ Con las tomas ofrecidas por la retransmision fue imposible observar la magnitud del contacto.”

The debate centres on whether the new angle provides enough evidence to change the interpretation of the challenge. According to “Archivo VAR”, the footage indicates that Rodri made contact with Danjuma before the striker had finished attempting to shoot, which would have warranted both a penalty for Valencia and a red card for the Barcelona midfielder.

The incident has therefore become a talking point despite Barcelona’s emphatic result. The Catalan side scored five times against Valencia in the fourth round of La Liga, but the newly published images have shifted attention towards the decision inside the penalty area and whether the available broadcast angles allowed the full nature of the challenge to be seen.

Readers were also invited to discuss the incident and other football news in the Koora forums.