José Mourinho Booked For Unusual VAR Protest

Fenerbahce’s manager, José Mourinho, received a booking from the referee on Sunday after a bizarre VAR incident. The incident unfolded after he vocally protested a VAR decision that ruled out a goal. Mourinho placed a laptop in front of a TV camera, showcasing an image to argue that the offside call was wrong. The former Tottenham, Manchester United, Chelsea, and Real Madrid manager told reporters he believed his striker Edin Dzeko was onside.

Mourinho Sees Yellow In Bizzare VAR Incident

Photo byPeter GlaseronUnsplash

Mourinho received a yellow card during Fenerbahce’s impressive 2-0 victory over Antalyaspor on Sunday. He placed a laptop in front of the TV cameras to make a bold statement against an offside refereeing decision. Referee Cihan Aydin denied Edin Dzeko’s goal for offside following VAR intervention in the 76th minute, with Fenerbahce leading 1-0. As a form of protest, Mourinho put a laptop displaying a still image of the incident in front of the ground camera of the broadcaster. He was then shown a yellow card for this incident.

“For us it was a good goal,” Mourinho said in Sunday’s post-game news conference. “I didn’t say a single word. I didn’t put any kind of pressure, I just put the laptop in there … I just reacted calmly.”

“The referee decided to give me a yellow card. It’s OK. I want a VAR that helps the referee. My analyst put the laptop in front of me with the position of the left-back that probably was not the position that VAR analyzed because we have the technical camera that gives us the complete width of the pitch and the left-back was in position, he added.

Mourinho Complains About International Break

Fenerbahce took the lead with a goal from Dusan Tadic, and Thalisson Kelven scored an own goal to seal the win for Mourinho’s side. The outcome leaves Fenerbahce firmly in second place, trailing Galatasaray by three points. Mourinho stated that the upcoming international break will not aid his team’s pursuit of the league title. “In the international break we do nothing because we don’t have players,” Mourinho said. “We can just keep six or seven players, the ones that are not selected to go or others that no longer play in their national teams.”

“International break for us is never positive, I would say in fact that it is negative … We have lots of things to work on, one of the things is players have to understand my concept, simplicity is genius. We have too many players that don’t understand that, the best players they play one touch, two-touch football. It’s simple, a cross and a goal, it doesn’t need 20 touches … football is simplicity.”

Conclusion

Mourinho also stated that the pressure he has felt at Fenerbahce this summer was self-inflicted. “The pressure I feel is the pressure I put on myself,” he said. “It’s not the pressure that anyone puts on me. I have around 1200 official matches, it’s too long to feel pressure from anybody, not journalists, not supporters, not opponents. I always want to do the things right, I always want to win, which is not possible. So the pressure is the pressure that I put in myself,” he said.

Fernerbache’s next fixture is against Twente in the Europa League. Twente drew to Man United in their first Europa League fixture, so Jose Mourinho will be careful as his team needs to pick up all three points.

Article originally written by Oladimejo Brown