Tottenham have appealed against the seven-match ban imposed on midfielder Rodrigo Bentancur for comments he made about teammate Heung-Min Son. Spurs do not dispute the guilty verdict of an independent committee, but consider the football association’s punishment too ‘severe’.
“We can confirm that the club has appealed against the length of Rodrigo Bentancur’s ban with the FA, which was issued earlier this week,” Spurs said. “While we accept the guilty finding against Rodrigo by the Independent Regulatory Commission, we believe that the subsequent sanction is severe. Rodrigo will remain suspended from domestic competitions while the appeal is heard and the Club will make no further comment during this period. “
Bentancur was sanctioned after an interview in the summer in which he told Uruguayan TV about Son: “Sonny, or one of Sonny’s cousins, as they all look more or less the same.” The independent panel ruled that this constituted an aggravated breach of FA rules as it included a reference to his team-mate’s “ethnic origin, colour, race and nationality”. Bentancur initially denied the accusation.
Given that Spurs have accepted the sanction but are disputing the charge, Bentancur’s absence is likely to last a long time. The FA Rules require a minimum tape hour of six matches for serious breaches of Rule E3.1. This ban may be reduced if it can be shown that the player could not reasonably have known that his comments would be offensive; in the case of Bentancur there seems to be no clear argument for this.
As the Regulatory Commission noted in its comments, Bentancur’s violation “requires an immediate suspension of six to 12 matches, with six matches being the ‘standard minimum penalty’. While the written submissions for the player vaguely suggest that a sanction of fewer than six games could or should be imposed here, no exception to that minimum applies.”
The seventh match of Bentancur’s ban, which only applies to domestic matches, is currently the match at home to Liverpool on December 22. Before that, Tottenham play Manchester City, Fulham, Bournemouth, Chelsea and Southampton in the Premier League before an EFL Cup tie against Manchester United.