Sports

Portugal Star Blames Referee For Loss To Morocco

#Portugal
by Last Updated
Pepe yelling at the referee

Getty Image / MB Media


The World Cup saw another major upset today.

Morocco continued their incredible run through the tournament and once against shocked the football win when they claimed a 1-0 win over Portugal.

The win made history for Morocco as they became the first African team to ever make it to a World Cup semi-final.

Unfortunately Morocco’s big moment didn’t sit particularly well with one of Portugal’s stars.

In his post-game interview, Portuguese defender Pepe blamed the referee for his team’s loss.

I think what the referee did today, you know, it was an Argentinian referee. After what Messi said yesterday, it seemed that there’s something very weird. We couldn’t play in the second half because the referee kept stopping the game.

We worked so hard. This is a World Cup. It’s not east to be here. And then someone like this referee comes here and doesn’t allow us to play… I’m very angry because they didn’t let us play.

It’s a pretty ridiculous assertion from Pepe. Over the course of the game, Morocco was called for 6 more fouls than Portugal and the ref gave a pretty soft 2nd yellow card to Walid Cheddar that had Morocco playing down a man during stoppage time.

Pepe also had a chance to prevent this loss, but missed a header from in close late in the game.

With their not being much controversy throughout the match, it sounds like Pepe is just trying to find an excuse for the loss.

Pepe isn’t the only Portugal player who didn’t handle this loss particularly well. Immediately after the final whistle, Cristiano Ronaldo headed for the tunnel instead of shaking the hands of Morocco’s players and congratulating them for their historic win.

You would think two stars with so much experience on the sport’s biggest stages would be able to handle a loss like this a bit better.