Look: we know things get heated on the field. Insults are flying just as often as tackles and forearms, and players really have to be aware of their surroundings.
If they aren’t, they’re liable to get cat-like scratches across the face.
And so it goes that Bayern Munich’s Rafinha will miss his next three Bundesliga matches after this incident against Borussia Dortmund detailed by our friends at Soccerly.After a somewhat suspect tackle on (Henrikh) Mkhitaryan, the Dortmunder jumped back to his feet to take exception to the foul. It appeared that was a bit of a verbal spat going on, and then Rafinha pounced in digging his hand into Mkhitaryan’s face. Bayern sporting director Matthias Sammer decided to make light of the situation:
“I’m not sure if he had a little extra lotion on his face, and wanted to give some of it away to him (Mkhitaryan).” Sammer did go on saying, “We accept the red card. At 91 minutes, though, the game is over. If I’m an official, I would walk over and say ‘Rafa, that’s usually a red.’ Then I would have shown the yellow.”
Oh, okay. Nothing like deciding the severity of a foul by the time on the clock.
Sammer’s quote is essentially like something coming out of The Onion. Honestly, before writing this thing I was preparing to make some sort of joke regarding what was so attractive on Mkhitaryan’s face. Just look at the photo. It looks like one of those times your mother, aunt or grandmother licked her hand to get food off your face. Bizarre.