Villas-Boas blasts refs: “Await Sporting president’s next appearance…” | OneFootball

The August edition of Dragões magazine hit the newsstands this Tuesday and, as usual, features an editorial signed by André Villas-Boas. The FC Porto president addresses, among other topics, refereeing at the start of the season, pointing to a “refereeing coincidence” that reflects “an almost touching randomness” in Sporting’s matches. “The key incidents always seem to go the same way and favour the same beneficiary,” he writes.

In the same text, Villas-Boas also takes a “dig” at Sporting president Frederico Varandas: “Perhaps he will take the opportunity to present the second volume of his work on sporting truth, this time with the suggestive title: ‘The possible standardisation and the miracle of permanent coincidence’.”

The Porto president expands on his criticism of refereeing: “In refereeing there is one truly comforting piece of news: the much-proclaimed standardisation of criteria does, after all, exist. Let us see: FC Porto’s matches have become genuine essays on blindness, with crystal-clear penalties evaporating until VAR uniquely refrains from intervening. In Sporting’s matches, meanwhile, refereeing coincidence reveals an almost touching randomness: the key incidents always seem to go the same way and favour the same beneficiary. Between goals wrongly disallowed for their opponents and red cards that go unshown, the cycle repeats itself with a regularity that should fill with pride those who promised to standardise criteria. It is not easy to make so many coincidences always move in the same direction year after year, especially with VAR, but even there one can recognise the quality of the work done. Let us therefore await the next appearance of the Sporting president at some book fair, so that he may enlighten us on the subject. Perhaps he will take the opportunity to present the second volume of his work on sporting truth, this time with the suggestive title: ‘The possible standardisation and the miracle of permanent coincidence’,” wrote André Villas-Boas.

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