Vítor Baía fined over incident with Frederico Varandas in 2022 | OneFootball

The former goalkeeper of the ‘blue and whites’ was fined for committing a crime of insult, after admitting the facts without showing any remorse.

Rui Cerqueira, who at the time was an adviser to the ‘dragons’, was also fined the same amount for a crime of assault on physical integrity in the context of a sporting event, after it was proven that he slapped Frederico Varandas’ hand. He was also banned from entering sports venues during match times for one year.

Vítor Baía and Rui Cerqueira were also ordered to pay compensation to the Sporting president, in the amounts of 3,500 and 2,500 euros, respectively.

The case dates back to February 2022, after a match between FC Porto and Sporting at the Estádio do Dragão, with the ‘lions’ announcing at the time that they would file a criminal complaint against Sérgio Conceição, then the coach, Vítor Baía and Rui Cerqueira, for “verbal assaults and attempted physical aggression” against the president of the Lisbon club.

“Sporting Clube de Portugal informs that president Frederico Varandas was yesterday [Friday] the target of verbal assaults and attempted physical aggression by Vítor Baía, vice-president and director of FC Porto SAD, Sérgio Conceição, the team’s coach, and Rui Cerqueira, press officer of the Porto club,” the ‘lions’ stated.

The Lisbon club specified that “the three individuals, surrounded by several security guards, lay in wait for Frederico Varandas” as he was heading to the team bus, and that “Rui Cerqueira violently rammed into the Sporting president, taking from his hand a wallet containing a mobile phone, personal ID cards and credit cards, and immediately fleeing the scene.”

In June 2022, Sérgio Conceição was cleared by the Disciplinary Council (CD) of the Portuguese Football Federation (FPF), while Vítor Baía and Rui Cerqueira were handed suspensions of 25 and 115 days, respectively.

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