This Poor Soccer Referee Got Hit Square In The Nuts By The Ball

The 2022-23 Champions League isn’t quite sorted out yet. While a number of teams secured spots in Europe’s top continental club tournament based on where they finished in their leagues, we’re still waiting for another six teams to get the full list of squads that will compete for the chance to lift the European Cup in Istanbul next year.

Two of those clubs are French side Monaco and Dutch runners-up PSV Eindhoven, which squared off on Tuesday in Monaco. The referee was Italy’s Davide Massa, and while you normally only learn the name of a referee because they made a horrible decision, that was not the case here.

Instead, you are learning Massa’s name because a soccer ball got kicked real hard at his crotch and he was unable to avoid it. Monaco’s Axel Disasi intercepted a pass and tried to play a through ball to one of his forwards. Instead, the ball hit Massa right in the nuts and the referee blew his whistle, presumably because he couldn’t move for a little.

Disasi seemed a little annoyed he couldn’t drive towards PSV’s goal and try to tie things up, but this is as good a reason as any for a game to immediately stop. And besides, things worked out for Disasi a little later in the game, when he scored the equalizer to tie things up at one before the second leg in Eindhoven.