Martínez Munuera will referee Barça - Real Madrid

The referee of the Valencian committee Juan Martínez Munuera will be in charge of refereeing the classic between Barcelona and Real Madrid this Sunday (9:00 p.m.), as confirmed by the Royal Spanish Football Federation (RFEF), and the VAR will be for Javier Iglesias Villanueva.

He will be accompanied on the wings by assistants Diego Barbero and Miguel Martínez, and the fourth referee will be José Antonio Palomares. In the VAR, there will be Javier Iglesias Villanueva as main and José Antonio López as assistant.

It will be the fifth classic that the referee of the Valencian committee referees. In the previous four, the baggage is one victory for Barcelona and three for Real Madrid. The culé victory was recorded in March 2022, in the League, at the Santiago Bernabéu, by 0-4. The last Madrid victory was the final of the 2024 Super Cup, 4-1. The other two were at the Camp Nou.

Martínez Munuera, from Benidorm (Alicante) who arrived in the First Division in the 2013-2014 season, has refereed Barcelona 40 times, with a record of 27 wins, 6 draws and 7 losses.

Real Madrid has been whistled 46 times, and the record is 30 games won for the whites, 9 draws and 7 games lost. Jose Mourinho, current coach of Real Madrid, expressed his discontent during the week that the name of the designated referee had been leaked to some media, although he wished him well during the match.

In addition, the merengue team reported Martínez Munuera to the RFEF Disciplinary Committee in March 2024 after a match against Osasuna for what they considered a “negligent drafting” of the minutes, by not including the phrase “Vinícius, die”, which would have been uttered from the stands. The Committee declared that the file be dismissed, since it considered that the referee should only record specific insults in the minutes if they are of a racist or homophobic nature.