Referee LucaMarelli commented on DAZN on the controversies that emerged during the Venezia-Inter match, focusing in particular on LionLauberbach's disallowed goal and CarlosAugusto's foul on Sohm. According to Marelli, the decision to disallow the goal was not due to an arm offside, as reported in some media, but a shoulder offside. “In real time you couldn't tell if he was offside or not,” he explained, noting that the shoulder can be used to play the ball and that the upper arm is considered “no handball.” His opinion is that Lauberbach's shoulder was beyond the last defender, with a difference of 3-4 centimeters sufficient for offside, and he added that the offside experiment with light was rejected.
Regarding the contact between Augusto and Sohm, Marelli defined the gesture as "an obvious foul", because Augusto touched Sohm's calf with his foot and body. “It's difficult to understand why VAR didn't intervene,” he said, recalling that VAR was created precisely to avoid similar situations. He qualified the foul as "bordering on a yellow card", but underlined that VAR should intervene in such clear cases.
Marelli then cited a similar episode that occurred in the Parma-Turin match, where a penalty not awarded due to a foul by Troilo on Davis was compared to that of Valdepenas on Thuram in Inter-Fiorentina. He praised the position of Massa, who saw the penalty awarded correctly. The referee concluded that VAR was created to handle these types of errors, although it may sometimes fail to intervene.
Marelli's entire analysis was published on DAZN and attracted the attention of SerieA fans and experts, who discussed the effectiveness of VAR and the need for greater precision in refereeing decisions. The Venice-Inter match remains an important case study for the evaluation of refereeing support technologies in Italy.