Penalty or not? unwritten law saves the BVB

Gladbach felt that he had been cheated out of a penalty in the top match against BVB. In fact, he should have been, but he didn’t have to, also because of an unwritten law.

In the first half of the top match between Borussia Mönchengladbach and Borussia Dortmund (1:2), injury time was already running out when the score of 0:1 in front of the visitors’ goal caused a commotion.

The scene had begun unspectacularly: Dortmund’s Emre Can played a back pass into his own penalty area to Dan-Axel Zagadou, who was put under pressure by Jonas Hofmann but had a fairly clear lead and was able to pass the ball on to his goalkeeper Roman Bürki without any problems.

However, when the goalkeeper hit the ball forward, Hofmann suddenly went down and stayed there. The Gladbachers protested, but referee Sascha Stegemann let play continue.