Defender Pepe, captain of the Portugal national team, made fiery statements after the end of his team's match against Morocco and their exit from the quarter-finals of the 2022 World Cup in Qatar, and accused FIFA of preparing to crown Argentina with the title for Lionel Messi.
The Moroccan national team achieved a historic achievement today, Saturday, and defeated Portugal with the goal of Youssef Al-Nusairi in the 42nd minute, ending the dreams of Cristiano Ronaldo and his companions to qualify for the semi-finals and continue the journey towards the first title in their history in the competition.
After the end of the match, Bibi appeared angry at the performance of Argentine referee Facundo Tello, and criticized his choice to manage this match, linking that to Messi's fiery statements against Spanish referee Matteo Lahoz, who officiated the Argentina-Netherlands match on Friday.
"After what happened yesterday and Messi's statements, it is unacceptable for an Argentine referee to manage this meeting, he was arrogant on the field, and I bet that everything here is prepared from For Argentina to win the title.
He added, "The second half did not witness any play, and the referee added only 8 minutes. We are working very hard. 8 minutes were added and there was no play. In the second half we just wanted to play. We are sad. We had the quality to win, and unfortunately we did not succeed in doing that."
The Portugal national team protested against what it considered a penalty shot in the first half after midfield Bruno Fernandes fell in the area of operations, and in the second half the Portuguese players again demanded a penalty kick for allegedly touching the ball to a Moroccan defender, and the referee did not resort to the video assistant referee (VAR) technique in the two shots. ).
For his part, midfield Bruno Fernandes appeared in support of Bibi's statements, and said, "I do not know if they will give the cup to Argentina."
After an intervention by the media officer of the Portugal national team, the Manchester United player added, "I do not care, I will say what I think and damn them. It is very strange that in our match there is a referee from a country that is still in the competition, and there is no Portuguese referee in return. It is clear that they stood up." Against us because they didn't give us a clear penalty kick in the first half."
Yesterday, Friday, Messi made statements criticizing the referee Lahoz for managing the match that ended with Argentina qualifying at the expense of the Netherlands with a penalty shootout. Lahoz broke the record for the number of yellow cards in the history of the World Cup, and the most famous 18 yellow cards for the elected players.