Rayo-Athletic: referee halts the match after paper planes and bottles

Referee Sánchez Martínez suspended the Rayo Vallecano-Athletic Club match for good after several object throwings at Vallecas. The game was stopped on the return to the Estadio de Vallecas and, when it was definitively halted, the score read 0-0.

According to the match report, in the 13th minute Protocolo 1 was triggered for a massive throw of paper planes and plastic balls (about 2 cm). The match then stayed paused for ten minutes. After the restart, in the 24th minute Protocolo 2 came into play: again paper planes and the same plastic balls, this time from the stand behind the dressing-room area. Both teams were sent back to the locker rooms for another ten minutes.

A stop-and-start crescendo

Once play resumed, 16 seconds later there was another set of objects—paper planes, plastic balls and plastic bottles—without anyone being hit. The act states that, advised by the Police National’s Security Coordinator, the referee was told the necessary safety conditions could not be guaranteed, so the match was definitively suspended. At the stop, 20 minutes and 44 seconds of regulation time remained, plus at least 10 minutes of stoppage time from the first interruption. Athletic’s party is already heading to Bilbao while the clash’s rescheduled date and the consequences for Rayo are awaited.