Mateu Lahoz gives out 15 cards during Barcelona vs Espanyol in controversial refereeing performance

Referee Mateu Lahoz was sent home during the World Cup in Qatar and now he's causing controversy once again, this time in La Liga.

Barcelona and Espanyol played out a heated derby affair in their return to club football, with an early Marcos Alonso goal being cancelled out by a Joselu penalty in the second half.

But the game caught fire from the 70th minute onwards, as the game saw nine minutes of additional time played following a flurry of cards, incidents and, of course, VAR.

It seems Lahoz picked up from where he left at the World Cup.

The Spanish referee was sent home from the WC for his refereeing performance in the quarter-final between Argentina and the Netherlands.

He was heavily criticised for having lost control of that game, with Lionel Messi and Emiliano Martinez speaking out in their post-match interviews.

Lahoz handed out an astonishing 15 yellow cards, plus a red to Denzel Dumfries after Argentina's victory in the penalty shootout.

But chaos ensued once again with Lahoz as he made the headlines once again in what was his first game after the WC, giving out 15 cards including two red cards in total.

Two of them were for Raphinha and Xavi, who were both off the pitch at the time, but the game turned into chaos between the 78th-83rd minute, as both Jordi Alba and Vinicius Souza were sent off in quick succession.

Leandro Cabrera was also dismissed, but then the decision was strangely overturned, with fans at home lamenting the performance of the infamous WC ref.

One fan poked fun at both Lahoz and the recent Al-Nassr signing Cristiano Ronaldo: "Might be time for Mateu Lahoz to also take his dwindling talents to the Saudi Arabian league."

Whilst another joked: "I tweeted this during Argentina vs. Netherlands. Lahoz is the kind of person to go to a funeral and be mad that he isn't the center of attention."

As another summarised Lahoz perfectly: "If you thought Netherlands vs Argentina was a full-on immersive Lahoz experience, welcome to the full show."

Mateu Lahoz refereeing any game pic.twitter.com/xDPdCgGNsa

— Paddy Power (@paddypower) December 31, 2022

Those 14 yellow cards shown by Lahoz today is a new record for his entire career in the Spanish first division.

Having been described as 'useless' by Messi and Martinez, the Spanish referee will surely have to answer to some governing body with that performance.

But he's likely to continue being part of big games in Spain and in the Champions League and we're sure this won't be the last you'll hear of the Spanish referee this season...