Barcelona were knocked out of the Champions League by Atletico Madrid this week, with Marcus Rashford and his team-mates complaining about the officiating over two legs

Barcelona have filed a fiery report to UEFA after Manchester United loanee Marcus Rashford and his team-mates lambasted the officiating in both legs of their Champions League quarter-final with Atletico Madrid. The Catalan stalwarts suffered a 2-0 loss to their La Liga rivals at the Nou Camp in their initial meeting – a game in which Pau Cubarsi was sent off 44 minutes into.

Rashford, however, took issue with Istvan Kovacs denying his side what appeared to be a blatant penalty and potential red card against Marc Pubill. The Atletico Madrid defender was already sitting on a yellow when he handled the ball he received from Juan Musso – believing it not to be in play.

Appeals from Barcelona were rife, but were ultimately waved away by the official – leading to the La Liga leaders lodging an official complaint with UEFA. That was also dismissed by the governing body, who replied in a statement: “Following the UEFA Champions League quarter-final first leg between Barcelona and Atlético, Barcelona filed a protest relating to a referee decision.”

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“The UEFA Control Ethics and Disciplinary Body has declared the protest to be inadmissible,” they added. Speaking with CBS Sports after the game, meanwhile, Rashford vented over what seemed to be a clear and obvious penalty in his club’s favour.

Rashford, whose future remains unclear beyond this season, said: “It’s clear to me; It’s a penalty. It’s happened before and it’s always been given.

“I don’t understand the decision. People talk about common sense, but common sense itself tells you it’s a penalty.

“Our reaction reflects that, but so does that of their own players. That counts, too.

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“I’ve been in similar situations in matches where the decision was a penalty. Ultimately, it’s hard not to complain when the decision goes against you.”

Having headed into their reverse at the Riyadh Air Metropolitano on Tuesday with a 2-0 deficit to overcome, Barcelona were quick to bring it back to level pegging on aggregate. Lamine Yamal opened the scoring just four minutes into the match, before Ferran Torres made it 2-0 on the night and 2-2 on aggregate 20 minutes later.

Ademola Lookman ultimately broke the hearts of Barca fans worldwide a third of the way through the match, however, to give Atleti the overall advantage once more. After a goalless second-half, Eric Garcia was shown an early exit with around 10 minutes left to play, as matters went from bad to worse for the visitors.

And after exiting the competition 3-2 in terms of total score over two legs, Raphinha was quick to criticise the officiating over both games. Speaking to TNT Sports Brasil, he said: “For me, we were robbed.

“I don’t want to talk about the refereeing, but we played extremely well, they committed I don’t know how many fouls, and the referee didn’t even pull out a single yellow card against them. The refereeing was very bad in all the decisions he made.

“What I really want to understand is, by what criteria is Barca being refereed? I’d really like to understand the secret behind this fear that haunts these people at the thought of Barca winning.

“Yes, we’re all human and we can make a mistake in a match, that’s something I can understand, but for it to happen in two consecutive matches? That’s not normal. I think the result of this double confrontation isn’t fair.”

Now, Barcelona are planning on sending more complaints UEFA’s way, with club president Joan Laporta also dubbing certain decisions as “disgraceful” in the aftermath. He told reporters: “We filed a complaint after the first leg and UEFA said it was ‘inadmissible.’

“We will ask for further explanations. The club will also make another complaint because what’s inadmissible is what happened to us on Tuesday once again.”