The Appeals Committee have rejected Athletic Bilbao’s application to have striker Aritz Aduriz’s two-game suspension overturned.
The Basques saw their forward handed the punishment by the Competition Committee earlier this week for his complaints towards the match official after being sent off at Granada for having been adjudged to have clashed with an opponent off the ball.
In response to this ruling, the club appealed to the Appeals Committee, arguing that the player was verbally hitting out at the decision, rather than the individual and that the Committee’s decision to rescind the red card suggested that the player’s frustration at the time was justified.
However, the Appeals Committee have maintained the two-game suspension for the insults directed at the match official, saying that the original refereeing decision ‘does not justify such expressions’, which are ‘indiscriminate and vulgar’.
