The RFEF's Disciplinary Committee 's sanction against Ángel Correa is now official.
And as we reported yesterday on MD, the Atlético de Madrid forward has been suspended for five matches following his reaction to being sent off last Sunday in Getafe . His reaction to referee Cuadra Fernández, as recorded in his referee's report, was, "Son of a bitch, coward. A motherfucker."
The RFEF 's disciplinary body considers Angel Correa 's attitude an insult, ruling out the more remote possibility that it could have been considered contempt. Therefore, they applied Article 99 of the Disciplinary Code regarding "insults, offenses, and insulting attitudes," which states the following: "Insulting, offending, or addressing the main referee, assistant referees, fourth official, directors, or sports authorities in insulting terms or attitudes, unless it constitutes a more serious offense, will be punished with a suspension of four to twelve matches."
Given that there is no precedent for this type of behavior this season, the disciplinary body has given him the minimum penalty. In addition to these four matches, a fifth match was added for the red card sent off for the tackle on Djené , which prompted the subsequent reaction.
The problem for Angel Correa is that we are facing a serious sanction that implies, in accordance with article 56 of the Disciplinary Code itself regarding the manner of compliance with sanctions, that it must be served in all competitions: "The suspension for matches that is a consequence of the commission of infractions of a serious or very serious nature, will imply the prohibition of lining up, acting, accessing the field of play, the bench and the changing room area, in as many of those as covered by the sanction for the order in which they take place, even if due to a change in the calendar, postponement, repetition, suspension or any other circumstance, the pre-established one at the beginning of the competition has changed.
They then begin serving their ban against Barcelona this weekend in the league match at the Estadio Metropolitano. They then face Espanyol, also in La Liga , just before the second leg of the Copa del Rey semi-finals against the Blaugrana at the Estadio Metropolitano . The ban will be completed with two more league matches against Sevilla and Valladolid . Atlético de Madrid now has ten days to appeal to the Appeals Committee, but, as this is the minimum possible sanction under this article, there is no possibility of it being reduced.