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Paris Saint-Germain striker Zlatan Ibrahimovic has been handed a four-match ban following his recent rant against the referees owning to a loss against Bordeaux in a Ligue 1 match due to poor officiating, confirms French Daily lequipe.
Sebastien Deneux, the president of the LFP disciplinary committee stated, "The punishment shows that the commission has not been not fully convinced by the explanations of Zlatan Ibrahimovic."
Initially, Zlatan’s representative and PSG sporting had argued that the player shouldn’t face punishment because the comments were not addressed directly to the official. However, the LFP disciplinary committee were anything but impressed by Zlatan’s conduct after he had missed the hearing.
"He has been sanctioned because of the offensive nature and rudeness of his words," added Sebastien Deneux, while stating that a match ban was added to his previous three-match ban for the frivolous appeal.
Zlatan will now be missing PSG’s league ties against Nice, Lille, Metz and Nantes, but should be available for this Saturday’s French Cup final against Bastia as his ban implements next week.
Was caught on camera insulting the referees
With the scoreline tied at 2-2 against Bordeaux, it was the incident in the 85th minute of the match that irked the Swede after the referees didn't award PSG an indirect free-kick after Bordeaux goalkeeper Cedric Carrasso handled the ball with his hands following a back pass from a defender.
Zlatan, who was very unhappy with the referee, was caught on Canal Plus TV saying, “In 15 years I’ve never seen a [good] referee in this sh*t country... [they] don’t even deserve PSG.”
The back-pass rule prohibits a keeper by FIFA’s 12th Law from handling the ball directly with his hand when a team-mate passes it back to him. The keeper is allowed to use his head or chest, but definitely not his hands.
Bordeaux would eventually go on to win the match, thanks to a late goal from Diego Rolan.
Marseille's Dimitri Payet who was also caught insulting the officials in a similar fashion the very same day was instead handed a two-match suspension. However, the primary concern is complete ignorance towards the wrong officiating by the referees as it continues to grow as an issue with referees being protected way more than the players in this modern age of football.
