Excluded for having responded with an ugly gesture to a provocation from the opposing goalkeeper, Vinicius Junior said he was “sorry” after the meeting between Valencia and Real Madrid (1-2) on Friday. His club hopes to have his red card rescinded.
A timid mea culpa. Sent off for an ugly gesture during Real Madrid’s stunning victory in Valencia (2-1), Friday, in a late match on the 12th day of La Liga, Vinicius Junior apologized on his social networks, at the end of the meeting. “Sorry and thank you to the team,” commented the Brazilian, sent to the locker room in the 79th minute of play, while the score was still 1-0 in favor of the locals.
As a symbol of Madrid’s mistakes and a certain nervousness, Vinicius was sent off after a nasty shove on Macedonian goalkeeper Stole Dimitrievski who received a yellow card for having provoked him. Absolutely beside himself, the Madrilenian was asked to leave the field, held back by several teammates and members of the staff. An assistant to Carlo Ancelotti even had to intervene to accompany him to the locker room and prevent him from worsening his case a little further, while he was exposed to several suspension matches.
An unjustified expulsion according to Ancelotti
“Vinicius was sent off for deliberately hitting an opponent in the head, without the ball being in play, using significant force. Once sent off, the player had to be restrained by members of his club and taken to the locker room while his protests continued,” the arbitrator noted in his report.
For its part, Real clearly does not intend to stop there. “We are going to appeal and file an appeal but I don’t know if it will be accepted. We think there was no red. It could have been resolved with a yellow card on each side. Vini suffered, he there are days when he is good and others where he is a little less, I hope he can participate in the next match,” said Ancelotti, who above all wanted to retain his team’s ability to take with forceps and in numerical inferiority.
“We were able to react after the red card. It’s difficult to explain how bad we were in the first half and how good we were in the second. I think overall the victory was deserved “, supported the Italian. After this match, which was initially scheduled for November 2 before being postponed due to deadly floods in the southeast of the country (231 deaths), Real found itself at the top of La Liga with 43 points, ahead of Atlético ( 41 pts), which however has one match less, and FC Barcelona (38 pts).
