ISTANBUL – Fenerbahce manager Jose Mourinho was given a four-match ban and fined by the Turkish Football Federation following his comments about Turkish referees after a match at Galatasaray.
The Turkish federation on Thursday fined the 62-year-old Portuguese coach 1.6 million Turkish lira ($44,000) after he criticized the match officials in a media conference following a 0-0 Super Lig draw on Monday.
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Mourinho served one of his suspended four games on Thursday when he was absent from the bench for Fenerbahce's 4-1 Turkish Cup win at Gaziantep.
Fenerbahce will appeal the four-game ban, Alper Alpoglu, the club's executive board member in charge of legal affairs, told Turkey’s state-run broadcaster TRT Spor. If Fenerbahce’s appeal is unsuccessful, Mourinho will miss the next three domestic games.
In his post-match interview on Monday, Mourinho welcomed the decision to bring in a foreign referee for the game and also praised Slavko Vincic of Slovenia for a “top performance.”
Mourinho said he’d gone to see the referee and thank him following the game. When he saw the fourth official — a Turkish referee — Mourinho said he told him: “If you are the referee ... would be a disaster.”
Asked about a challenge early in the match, he said a Turkish referee would have reacted with a yellow card “after the big dive and their bench jumping around like monkeys.”
The Turkish federation said the ban and fine were instituted due to “derogatory and offensive statements towards the Turkish referee” and accusations of chaos and disorder in Turkish football.
It said Mourinho’s remarks violated sports ethics, promoted violence and disorder and could incite fan incidents.
Fenerbahce says Mourinho’s comments were taken out of context and deliberately distorted.
Alpoglu said the league disciplinary board’s decision was not taken “unanimously.”
“We don’t find the (decision) to be legal. We do not think that the word our manager used falls into the definitions of insult, or foul language, or an unsportsmanlike statement,” he said.
Alpoglu added: “In the derby, our opponent has, once again, taken a word out of its meaning, as we are accustomed to, and has been occupying the agenda and public opinion for three days with something meaningless and has no legal basis.”
Former Chelsea, Manchester United and Tottenham manager Mourinho has previously been fined and suspended for his comments about Turkish match officials.
On Wednesday, former Chelsea striker Didier Drogba supported his former coach and said Mourinho “is not a racist and history is there to prove it.”
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