In a rare occurrence on the football fields, a player from the Azerbaijani club Qarabağ requested the referee to disallow a goal he scored during the match against French Marseille on Thursday, in the second leg of the qualifying playoff for the knockout stage of the Conference League. The Azerbaijani team had lost the first leg 1-3 and was trailing in the early stages of the return match in Baku with a goal from Senegalese player Pape Gueye (12 minutes in).
The incident took place in the 34th minute when Qarabağ player Ibrahim Wadji scored a clear goal using his hand, which the Marseille players protested vehemently, especially since there was no Video Assistant Referee (VAR) available for this competition. In a tense atmosphere between the players of both teams, Wadji approached his coach Gurban Gurbanov, and after a discussion with the Polish referee Bartosz Frankowski, he managed to convince him to disallow the goal after admitting that he had touched the ball with his hand before scoring.
The match resumed after being interrupted for nearly ten minutes due to this incident. The continental federation commented on the live stream of the match saying, "Qarabağ's coach asked player Wadji if he scored the goal with his hand, to which he replied affirmatively, prompting the home team to ask the referee to disallow the goal. It is a rare act filled with sportsmanship."
