Players union want Sulley Muntari yellow card quashed following racial abuse protest
World football players’ union FIFPro urges Italian football powers to quash yellow card for leaving the pitch
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World football players’ union FIFPro urged Italian football powers on Tuesday to quash Sulley Muntari’s yellow card for leaving the pitch over the weekend, after fans hurled racial abuse at the Ghanian player.
The former AC Milan and Inter midfielder dramatically left the field on Sunday while playing for Pescara at Cagliari after he angrily confronted Cagliari fans, claiming to have been racially abused before being booked.
Muntari, 32, could now face disciplinary measures after deciding to leave the field seconds before full-time – a decision that earned him a second yellow card, and then a red, from referee Daniele Minelli.
“FIFPro believes Muntari’s yellow card should be rescinded,” the Dutch-based union said in a statement.
“Muntari was well within his rights to approach referee Daniele Minelli, as the first point of reference, to make his grievances known and seek a solution,” it said from its headquarters outside Amsterdam.
“No player should ever feel the need to take matters into his own hands, as Muntari clearly felt obliged to do, by abandoning the match or taking spectators to task for inappropriate behaviour,” it said.
Muntari was at AC Milan when former teammate Kevin Prince Boateng angrily walked off the pitch while being targeted with racist abuse during a friendly with lower league side Pro Patria in January 2013.
It prompted a wave of support on social media, although football’s ruling body Fifa, while applauding Boateng’s principles, said it did not condone his decision to walk off.
