MUNICH — Chelsea manager Enzo Maresca said Jonathan Tah escaped a “clear red card” in the first half of their 3-1 defeat to Bayern Munich on Wednesday.
Tah was given a yellow card after he tangled with João Pedro off the ball as they chased a ball behind Bayern’s defence. Tah looked to swing his arm into Pedro’s throat, leaving the Brazilian forward prone on the floor.
Maresca was aggrieved at the decision, and his protests led to him being shown a yellow card by referee Jose Maria Sanchez.
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And post-match, as he picked apart Chelsea’s 3-1 defeat, Maresca said there was no question that Tah should’ve been sent off.
“For me it’s a clear red card. When there is not an intention to go for the go for the ball, just to kick the player, why is it not a red card? It’s not aggressive enough the referee said. To give a red card, they need to see blood? For me the intention was to injure so there’s no doubt.”
Bayern manager Vincent Kompany however, said he saw the incident a different way.
“I wanted a foul the other way — I thought he was fouled,” Kompany said. “I might be biased. I think his shirt got pulled and was tried to free himself and so as a defender, you just want to shake him off.
“Overall, I don’t want to discuss it too much but it’s not in my opinion that big an event in that sense.”
While that was the focus of Maresca’s post-match press conference, Kompany’s was around Harry Kane after his two goals helped Bayern to their 3-1 win.
Bayern’s opener came through brilliant play from Michael Olise as his ball cannoned in off Trevoh Chalobah for an own goal, while Kane added a second soon after from the spot after he was brought down by Moisés Caicedo.
Cole Palmer then scored a wonderful goal to get Chelsea on the board, but Kane added his second and Bayern’s third in the 63rd minute to sew things up.
Maresca said overall he was pleased with the performance.
“Personally I am happy with the performance, we knew how difficult it would be to come here against this team,” he said. “We knew it’ll be a tough game but overall we competed very well.
“The first 20 minus we didn’t concede nothing. We were in the game until the end. It’s very difficult to come here to control the game for 95 minutes, it’s not reality.”
Kompany was keen to downplay any early optimism over Bayern’s fortunes this season, repeatedly emphasising how this was only one game, but he did praise Kane’s work ethic after he scored his ninth and 10th goals of the season, in only his sixth match.
“The, the main thing I can say is just watch his work off the ball, watch the press, watch how the team recover and the chances we create,” Kompany said. “Look at him for the first goal as he pressed, then came back to stay onside and then pressed again.
“So the main thing for him is he spends that much energy and he gets rewarded, he gets the chances off the back of it. But I think that’s maybe the side of it that I keep highlighting because we can talk about qualities and talent, but in the end there’s a lot of hard work for him to be where he’s at.”
Kane said to DAZN: “Amazing result. It was a tough game against a really good side. We said before the game they’re club world champions. We had it to be on it from the start and we were.
“In the second half we created the better chances and it was good to get that second goal. As the game went on it felt like they got more tired, spaces opened up and we were able to exploit that.
“We talked a lot about when other teams try to play, we’re only two or three seconds from having a chance ourselves. It fell to me in a nice place and was a good finish.”
