UEFA changes yellow card rules

UEFA has introduced a new rule on yellow cards picked up by players in the Champions League and Europa League matches which will take effect from the 2014/15 season.

The rule stipulates that every yellow card picked up by a player starting from the group stage will expire at the quarter-final phase.

Meaning the new rule will enable all yellow cards wiped off after the quarter-finals and prevent players from being suspended for the semi-final matches of both European competitions.


An official UEFA statement read: “Following a recommendation by the UEFA Club Competitions Committee – in order to implement in UEFA club competitions a rule which is already in force in the UEFA European Football Championship – the Emergency Panel decided that, as of this season, all yellow cards from the beginning of the group stage will expire on completion of the quarter-finals.

“Bookings will therefore not be carried forward to the semi-finals.”

We can recall that Real Madrid’s Xabi Alonso missed last season’s victorious showpiece in Lisbon after picking up a third caution of the campaign in the semi-final against Bayern Munich.

The Spaniard joined an exclusive club of players who missed the final after picking up a booking in the last-four with Roy Keane and Paul Scholes suffering a similar fate in 1999.

The situation came to its excruciating climax when Branislav Ivanovic, Ramires and Raul Meireles of Chelsea and David Alaba, Holger Badstuber and Luis Gustavo of Bayern all missed the 2012 Champions League final.



Source:Allsoccerplanet