TAD scraps €17,850 fine for FC Porto over ‘Dragões Diário’ piece | OneFootball

The Sports Arbitration Court (TAD) upheld the appeal filed by FC Porto and annulled the sanction imposed by the Disciplinary Board (CD) of the Portuguese Football Federation (FPF), following statements about refereeing published in the Dragões Diário newsletter.

The disciplinary proceedings that led to the now-revoked penalty were based on a complaint filed by the FPF Refereeing Board on February 18, 2026. At issue were comments published in the Porto club’s newsletter after the match between Sporting and Famalicão. The sentence that gave rise to the sanction was: “It seems that someone is in charge of refereeing in Portugal, and clearly it is not its officials.”

The FPF’s Disciplinary Board considered at the time that the statements, introduced in the text by the expression “it may seem like a joke, but it isn’t,” harmed the honor and reputation of the bodies within the sports structure.

In the decision now made public, the majority of the arbitral panel concluded that FC Porto had not committed any disciplinary offense. The ruling was based on the right to freedom of expression and stressed that the statements must be understood within the so-called “language of football,” which is usually harsher and more forceful because of the passions associated with the sport.

Arbitrators José Ricardo Gonçalves and Sónia Carneiro held that those responsible for refereeing, as public figures subject to constant scrutiny, must have a greater ability to deal with this type of criticism. In the court’s view, the sentence amounted to an expression of protest and a sporting attack on a rival, rather than being understood as a gratuitous offense against the honor of those concerned.

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