Fabinho Soldado slams refereeing in Corinthians loss, urges change

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Central do Timão

·6 de noviembre de 2025

Fabinho Soldado slams refereeing in Corinthians loss, urges change

By Vinícios Cotrim | Central do Timão Editorial Team

Corinthians was defeated by Red Bull Bragantino in the 32nd round of the Brasileirão, but the spotlight of the match ended up on the refereeing. The players complained during the game and, after the final whistle, Fabinho Soldado expressed his thoughts on this problem in Brazilian football.

“I’m going to talk about the structure of football. We have sent official letters, the president himself has been present in person, I have been there several times. We hear that the intention is to improve, we need to do our part. There is a lot of pressure on the referees, that’s true, we don’t want to change the focus of the match because Dorival will certainly make the technical evaluations of the game,” began the executive in the mixed zone of Estádio Cícero de Souza Marques.

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Photo: TV Central do Timão

Corinthians had two players sent off in the match, José Martínez and Charles, in addition to André Carrillo being suspended for receiving his third yellow card in the Brasileirão. Furthermore, Dorival still has doubts about Raniele’s availability, who left in the first half with discomfort in his thigh.

“It’s not about shifting responsibility, but the truth is that today was yet another very confusing refereeing performance that will bring a lot of trouble for Corinthians regarding the cards, the way it happened, the insecurity during the match, but I don’t want to talk only about her, about Edina. Even though in the Brasileirão, the referee goes almost a month without officiating a game, they need that match time. But we need to improve the structure of Brazilian football. We have tried to cooperate, but we can’t be harmed once again because of this,” he added.

The topic of refereeing has been frequent in this edition of the Brasileirão, even resulting in the removal of a referee and the person responsible for VAR calls. Moreover, the CBF itself has already acknowledged clear mistakes in matches of the competition.

“Every round, all the clubs complain. I need to keep talking about the structure of refereeing. Some clubs have a way of complaining even when they win, others complain when they lose, so, each one tries in their own way and, again, we end up talking about each round, about referee A, referee B, and each one uses their own strategy. It can’t be like this, refereeing needs to have unique, standardized criteria, so that even if there are mistakes, they happen within those criteria,” commented Soldado.

“Our expectation is that the criteria would be aligned so that in each game, each round, the criteria would be well defined, and within the same match there wouldn’t be situations where, at one moment, the referee interprets a play one way, and in the next minute, interprets it differently,” he added.

The current president of the CBF, Samir Xaud, has already commented on a possible change in the Brazilian refereeing committee for 2026. Furthermore, there is also a desire to professionalize the role, since many referees share their commitments with other professions.

“So, if we don’t talk about structure, we’ll be here every round, every round talking, each club using its own strategy and it won’t be good for football. I think we need to have a definitive conversation so that we can improve all of this,” concluded Fabinho Soldado.

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