Nine months of suspension, and a very ban on changing rooms until September 15, 2025, such was the sentence pronounced Wednesday evening by the Disciplinary Commission of the Professional Football League against Paulo Fonseca, the OL coach considered guilty of intimidation with regard to the referee of the L1 Lyon-Brest match, Benoît Millot.
At this hour, the sacred union is decreed at the Gones, where we ensure that we block around the Portuguese technician, which will be inevitably limited in its functions now. John Textor refuses to consider the departure of the strategist he wanted so much, denouncing the extreme severity of the French football bodies for a sanction which does not fail to debate.
The instructor's instructions
At the origin of this radical judgment, an intolerable blood stroke on the part of the technician concerned of course but also a strange exchange between arbitrators. On Wednesday, the management of the arbitration shared the sounds of the conversation between Mr. Millot and his assistants, including the Var, at the time of the facts. And it is a detail that challenges.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J8_6_FS2Ha
While Paulo Fonseca was screaming his disapproval while Mr. Millot consulted video assistance for a potential penalty linked to a Lyonnaise hand in the penalty area, it was Mr. Leonard, then fourth referee, who enjoined his colleague to expel the OL coach – who lost all lucidity at this precise moment (“you are going to put a second warning to Fonseca and Red”). An exceeding of function which will therefore not have been without consequences, and which inevitably gives grain to grind the detractors of the arbitral body during this period of severe tensions.
