Referee Panel: Badjo Deserved Red, Zvezda Penalty Stands

Two days after the 180th eternal derby, Partizan was still fuming. Sasa Ilic and the club’s leadership were furious over Nenad Minakovic’s officiating, angry enough that the club issued an urgent statement demanding the referee never take charge of their matches against Red Star again. On Friday, September 9, an answer arrived, not from the club, but from the profession itself.

The Referee Committee of the Football Association of Serbia (FSS) published a video analysis of the derby’s contested moments at Marakana, which Red Star won 2-1. Committee chairman Frank de Bleker walked his younger colleagues through the two situations that dominated headlines after the match: a first half penalty for the home side, and Mahmud Badjo’s tackle in stoppage time.

The first disputed scene came when a Partizan defender challenged Matej Gastarov inside the penalty area. Minakovic initially let play continue, but the VAR booth, led by Momcilo Markovic, called him over for an on field review. After the OFR, the referee pointed to the spot, Mirko Ivanic converted the penalty, and Red Star took the lead. The committee rated that call as fully correct.

Here is how Frank de Bleker explained the penalty in the official analysis:

The defender challenged his opponent, who had entered the penalty area with the ball, but did not play the ball and instead made contact with the attacker’s leg. Since VAR had clear video evidence of the offense, it called the referee for an OFR, who correctly awarded the penalty kick.

Partizan never seriously disputed that decision. The real argument was only beginning.

The fifth minute of second half stoppage time brought the second scene. Mahmud Badjo came in from behind on Milan Vukotic, with both legs and at full speed. Minakovic showed only a yellow card, and this time no call came from the VAR booth at the FSS Sports Center. The Referee Committee has now admitted that was a mistake.

The committee’s explanation of that foul reads:

The player committed a foul from behind on his opponent, using both legs as well as high speed and intensity. The fact that the player played the ball does not diminish the severity of this kind of foul, since the opponent’s safety was endangered. In this situation, VAR intervention was expected in order for a red card to be shown.

In other words, both Minakovic and Markovic misjudged that situation, and VAR failed to step in exactly where it was needed most.

That gives Partizan’s complaint partial backing from the very body that rules on referees. The club had asked for Minakovic to be taken off their matches for good, arguing it had been wronged on several occasions. The Referee Committee now says one of those complaints, the missed red card for Badjo, was indeed justified, while the other, the penalty for Red Star, remains entirely clean.

The review did not stop at the derby. The same committee also examined other contested moments from the Super League’s eighth round. In the match between Radnicki and Cukaricki, referee Lazar Lukic sent off Kosija after a VAR review for an elbow to the head of Karel Mustma and awarded a penalty to the away side, a decision the committee fully upheld. Also confirmed were Srdjan Jovanovic’s 78th minute red card to Andrej Vukicevic in the OFK Beograd vs. IMT match (1-1), and the disallowed goal in the Novi Pazar vs. Zeleznicar match, ruled out for offside in the 40th minute.

For Minakovic, this is not a damning report. The penalty call was defended by the profession, not by him alone, but the mistake in the derby’s closing minutes remains on record, in a document signed by the man at the head of the Referee Committee. Whether he will take charge of the derby again remains an open question. The next meeting between Red Star and Partizan is not scheduled until the spring part of the season, and until then the FSS will have plenty of time to decide whom it trusts most.