Mark Clattenburg is an English soccer referee who has been whistling matches in Saudi Arabia since 2017. He left until there, a few months after he refereed the final of the British FA Cup, that of the French Euro Cup (France 0 - Portugal 1) and, above all, that of the Champions League final, after almost 13 years in the Premier. Today, at 45, he talks in the 'Daily Mail' about who have been the most annoying players during his career. Namely: Craig Bellamy , Roy Keane , Jens Lehmann , Obi Mikel and Pepe . With the Portuguese central defender he coincided in that Milan final between Real Madrid and Atlético, where he still remembers the error in Sergio Ramos' initial goal .

"In that final, Real Madrid went 1-0 in the first half, but the goal was offside for very little. We realized at half time. It was a difficult action and my assistant failed," admits Clattenburg in statements to the British newspaper

As soon as the second half started, Pepe's penalty would come to Fernando Torres . And Clattenburg responded to the intense complaints from the Portuguese defender to remind him of his own mistake: "Pepe fouled Torres. He was furious and said to me in perfect English: 'That is never a penalty, Mark'. I replied: 'Your first goal he shouldn't have gone up on the scoreboard. 'He just shut up. "

"People will think it's weird, because two mistakes don't make a success. The referees didn't think that way, but the players did. I knew that if I told him that, he would accept the situation. It wasn't fun to referee him, you had to be constantly watching", The referee recognizes, four years after that European derby in Milan, that Real Madrid ended up winning on penalties.

The clash with Carrasco

The British referee also recalled another incident of Pepe in that famous Champions League final. The center-back collided with Carrasco in one action and remained rolling for a few seconds on the pitch. "Inside my head I thought: 'Are you lazy to be that big?'. Pepe was acting. He did it twice in that game, trying to expel an Atlético player. Another referee would have fallen into the trap, but I he had done his homework and, although it is not about prejudging, I knew his mentality, "he recalls.

For situations like this, Clattenburg put Pepe among that bunch of players so uncomfortable to referee. "It was good to meet him to try to take him. He is a player you can't trust. A game could be easy and, suddenly, he was doing something. You had to be on guard constantly."

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