The Minister of Culture, Youth and Sports will meet with Frederico Varandas, at his request, following the incidents that occurred during the visit of the two-time national handball champions to FC Porto, he confirmed government source.
Questioned by Lusa, an official source from the Ministry of Margarida Balseiro Lopes confirmed the request for a hearing and the scheduling of the meeting for Wednesday.
“In the current context of national handball and the Government’s continuous monitoring of the topic, the Minister of Culture, Youth and Sports, Margarida Balseiro Lopes, and the Secretary of State for Sports, Pedro Dias, together with Miguel Laranjeiro, president of the Portuguese Handball Federation, the sport’s regulatory body in Portugal, will receive the president of Sporting Clube de Portugal, next Wednesday”, reads the response to Lusa.
The Lisbon club’s request came one day after incidents allegedly involving FC Porto, in this case in the handball game at Dragão Arena, with the Sporting accusing ‘dragons’ “of shady practices” and when their members had to receive medical assistance.
“The most recent chapter in this unacceptable chain of episodes reaches a level that goes beyond all limits: a changing room with an intense, toxic smell that affected the physical state of players and employees of the handball team. This is not only regrettable, it is criminal”, accuses Sporting.
A situation that FC Porto, which would lose the national handball game, denied, considering, still on Saturday, the “serious and abusive” accusations, in addition to mentioning that he called the Public Security Police to check the conditions at Arena Dragão.
Sporting denounced “disrespectful” practices
In this statement, Sporting denounced practices of “disrespect” and “conditioning” by FC Porto, considering “it is essential that those who regulate sport in Portugal take a firm and relentless position and punish, with all severity, these unworthy behaviors, which already exceed the limits of what is permissible in a rule of law”.
“Sporting considers it imperative that all institutions responsible for the protection of sport are promoters of sporting truth, and it is not acceptable that behavior of this nature – repeatedly carried out by the same actors – brings shame and puts into question the image of Portuguese sport on an international level”, he adds.
Os ‘lions’ also maintain that these “episodes are neither isolated nor accidental”recalling recent incidents also involving FC Porto, such as the video played on the locker room television of football referee Fábio Veríssimo, in a “clear attempt at conditioning”, or the hiding of balls by the catchers and theft of towels in the I Liga classic, at Dragão.
“If there was still any naive illusion that the dark practices of the past had been eradicated, reality took care of destroying it in a brutal and unequivocal way. What we see today is not just a repetition: it is a refined escalation. More vile, more base and even more unspeakable than the darkest episodes that stained Portuguese sport”, detailed, on Sunday, the Lisbon club.
Before, the management of the had made a report to the Disciplinary Council to determine disciplinary responsibilities for the incidents that occurred in the derby between FC Porto and Sporting.
The game, counting for the first round of the second phase of the national championship, which ended with Sporting’s victory, 33-30, started about 15 minutes lateafter the Lisbon team complained of an intense odor in their dressing room, and coach Ricardo Costa and player Christian Moga received medical assistance.
FC Porto, which “absolutely, clearly and unequivocally” denied the alleged incidents in the visiting dressing room at Dragão Arena, accused, through the general director of sports, Mário Santos, the player Martim Costa of having attacked a ‘blue and white’ fan during the warm-up phase for the game.
