Rui Costa calls for punishment for FC Porto over Fábio Veríssimo | OneFootball

Upon arriving in Leiria for a dinner with Benfica supporters, Rui Costa stated that FC Porto should be sanctioned following the alleged pressure on Fábio Veríssimo during the match against Sp. Braga. “We are going to investigate everything and wait to see what happens. Obviously, we expect there to be some punishment for what happened in the FC Porto game. It’s not normal, it’s not explainable for a situation like that to occur, but we’ll wait and see,” emphasized the Eagles’ official, adding: “We took a stand in a statement and I’m not going to shy away from it. Benfica expects a swift response from the authorities who must speak out at this moment because this is something that cannot happen in Portuguese football. Such a situation cannot happen in a match, it’s far too serious!”

The president and candidate for re-election as club leader also said he was surprised by the statement published by FC Porto this Tuesday following the incident. “It’s quite surprising. To see such a lengthy statement, with seven paragraphs if I’m not mistaken, where the main issue isn’t addressed. It’s almost an attempt to divert attention from what actually happened and there’s no acknowledgement of what took place. They have no way of doing so because it’s just too obvious,” he stated.

Regarding Wednesday’s match against Bayer Leverkusen, Rui Costa expressed confidence in the outcome. “We’re going into the 4th round, we have 3 defeats at the moment, but we haven’t abandoned the competition. Tomorrow we have an important match in which we need to give a good response. The Luz will be packed and will push the team towards victory,” he said.

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