Rui Costa boycotts FPF gala as Benfica protest | OneFootball

Rui Costa decided not to attend the Portugal Football Globes, an FPF event, this Monday, in a symbolic gesture of protest over Benfica’s dissatisfaction with the state of refereeing and Portuguese football. The Eagles were represented by vice-presidents Tomás Barroso and Mónica Sabrosa.

The Eagles’ president had complained after the clássico about the refereeing team led by Miguel Nogueira’s “tremendous inconsistency in disciplinary criteria.” “The number of fouls Porto committed that were not punished with a yellow card gave more strength to one team and took strength away from the other. This is what everyone saw,” he said at the Estádio do Dragão.

The decision not to attend the FPF Gala (the body led by Pedro Proença), unlike Frederico Varandas and André Villas-Boas, presidents of Sporting and Porto respectively, is also related, among other issues, to Benfica’s position in the process of centralizing the sale of television rights.

Benfica are currently going against the other clubs and the League and are trying to stop the process. The petition calling for the suspension and review of the Centralized Marketing Model for Audiovisual Rights will be discussed in Parliament after surpassing 7,500 signatures.

As he arrived at the event, Villas-Boas took a jab at Rui Costa. “Duality of criteria? I don’t know. There was a curious incident last season in Guimarães between Sudakov and a Vitória player. I don’t know if that’s the duality of criteria he’s referring to,” he said.

This article was translated into English by Artificial Intelligence. You can read the original version in 🇵🇹 here.