Being a referee is not easy. Every decision they make is scrutinized, and sometimes controversy follows them no matter what they do. But there’s a big difference between human error and assigning a refereeing team that, from the start, raises suspicions.

I don’t want to sound like a bitter fan, nor am I here to justify the shortcomings of the Peruvian national team. I know that Venezuela is currently ahead in terms of gameplay and that Peru has a lot to improve. Even so, the least one expects in a match of this magnitude is an impartial refereeing team, free from any doubt.

So, which brilliant mind thought it was a good idea to assign Chilean referees to a crucial match between Peru and Venezuela? South America has referees from Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay, Paraguay, Colombia, Ecuador, and Bolivia… yet, curiously, we get officials from a country with which we’ve had historic football tensions. Come on, this is like assigning a Kuwaiti referee to an Iran vs. Iraq match or an Austrian one to a Germany vs. Spain clash in the World Cup. What were they thinking? In the Chile vs. Paraguay match, the referee wasn’t Peruvian, he was Brazilian. And if he had been Peruvian, I would understand the Chilean fans’ frustration.

I won’t argue whether the disallowed goal, the handball, or Guerrero’s fall were the right calls. Maybe the referees had valid reasons for their decisions. After all, they are professionals. But since they were Chilean, the perception of bias is magnified, and the suspicion of a setup lingers in the air. And that, ladies and gentlemen, is the fault of the federation that placed them there.

At the end of the day, both Peru and Chile lose because of these decisions. And while hope is the last thing to fade, I will keep supporting La Blanquirroja, hoping that one day we’ll talk more about football than controversial refereeing.