El Arabi frustrated with referee after Real Madrid loss

Youssef El Arabi was unable to hide his frustration with referee Juan Martinez Munuera’s display in Granada’s 1-0 La Liga loss to Real Madrid at the Santiago Bernabeu on Saturday.

Martinez Munuera controversially ruled out El Arabi’s effort halfway through the first half, before allowing Karim Benzema’s second-half goal to stand after Isco had seemingly strayed in an offside position in the build-up to the winner.

Madrid felt aggrieved in the closing stages of the game when they were denied a penalty after Isco was seemingly fouled in the box, yet El Arabi feels Rafael Benitez’s side have little reason to complain.

“I don’t know whether Madrid deserved a penalty,” El Arabi told Canal Plus. “The referee did not call a few fouls in our favour either.

“We all know that my goal was not offside.”

Nevertheless, El Arabi thinks Granada put in a strong performance after they were beaten 9-1 in the same fixture last season.

“We are happy with our performance. We were beaten by a strong team. We created two fine chances. It would have changed the game had we converted those,” he added.

“Madrid are a team that can score a goal from out of nowhere. We played different than we did last year and we can win a lot of games if we play like this.”

Granada coach Jose Ramon Sandoval, meanwhile, refused to blame the referee for his side’s defeat.

He said: “I never talk about the referee. It is up to other people to judge. We could have got a better result had we been a bit luckier.”