Mourinho brings receipts in bizarre post-game referee rant
José Mourinho turned up to his press conference with printed receipts of incidents he believed were worthy of a red card in Real Madrid’s 2-1 loss to Atlético Madrid.
The legendary coach couldn’t hide his anger as he showed reporters images of two contentious challenges by Cristian Romero and Lee Kang-in, which he fet were incorrectly officiated by the on-field referee and VAR officials.
Mourinho informs reporters of the two calls he believes were incorrect. X
“We can skip the press conference because the story of the match is right here,” he said, showing a picture of Romero’s challenge on Jude Bellingham.
Romero was attempting to beat Bellingham to a loose ball when the Englishman slid down on the turf and had his knee stepped on by his Argentine opponent.
Bellingham was immediately shown a yellow card for his role in the incident, but it was retracted after a video review. Romero was then shown yellow for his actions.
Mourinho could be seen pleading with officials for Romero’s actions to be upgraded to a red card, but his vibrant appeal was ignored.
Shortly after, Mourinho watched as Real Madrid’s Dean Huijsen was shown red.
He then fumed as Atlético’s Lee Kang-in pushed his studs into the left ankle of Federico Valverde when challenging for the ball, but receive no punishment.
Real Madrid claim Valverde has suffered “severe trauma to his ankle” due to the crunching tackle. He will undergo tests to determine the severity of his injury.
“Those were two clear red cards,” Mourinho said as he showed the image of Kang-in’s nasty tackle attempt.
“Given the difficulties we faced afterwards playing 11 against 10, we can only imagine what 50 minutes of 11 against 9 would’ve been like.
“I’ll have to limit myself to hugging my players, who gave it their all and played a first half, showed great class and character, setting us up perfectly to win.”
Despite the contentious calls, Mourinho said he was happy to see the grit and determination of his playing group given the poor circumstances.
He did confirm that he did not watch the VAR replay of his own player’s red card.
Mourinho insists he “wants to believe” the match officials had simply made a mistake in those calls and did not deliberately ignore the contentious challenges.
Bellingham and Romero act after their challenge. AP Photo/Bernat Armangue
“I want to believe they are mistakes, just as a coach makes mistakes, just as a player makes mistakes,” Mourinho said.
“It’s a referee [Ortiz Arias] who at 41 doesn’t have international experience. I don’t know why he was the referee. The poor guy couldn’t cope with the pressure.
“But for [the VAR] there’s no pressure, at [the Spanish football federation’s headquarters] Las Rozas there’s no pressure, or maybe there is and we don’t know. That combination – a poor referee, who’s only done small games, and a VAR with a big history. Congratulations to the CTA [Spain’s referees committee].”
Atlético manager Diego Simeone made clear when advised of his rival manager’s comments that he feels referees deserve better respect from the football world.
“There are moments in a match ... sometimes they benefit you, sometimes they disadvantage you,” he said.
“What I do understand is that respect for the referees... we have to sustain that because if not, there is nothing. When we go outside that respect, it doesn’t matter if you’re Mourinho, Simeone, Pellegrini or Flick, you can’t cross that line.”
The scores were level at the time of the two nasty challenges and Huijsen’s dismissal, but Alejandro Grimaldo nailed a penalty kick to put Atletico up at the start the second half.
Johnathan David pushed the home side’s lead out to 2-0 in the 59th minute before Antonio Rudiger scored Real Madrid’s solitary goal in the 89th minute.
Mourinho, despite being disappointed by his team’s position on the table (fourth) after seven rounds, is still confident Real will be a title contender.
“If ‘they’ (the officials) leave us in peace, and let us compete on an even playing field, there’s a long way left,” he said.
