Daniel Farke critical of Junior Firpo, Millwall man and FA video investigation for violent conduct ban — YEP 9/11/24

 

 

By Graham Smyth

Leeds United boss Daniel Farke has criticised Junior Firpo, Millwall's Danny McNamara and the decision to use video footage to ban the Whites defender over an apparent headbutt.

An FA panel took the decision to hand Firpo a three-game ban over an incident that occured late on in Wednesday's 1-0 defeat in London. The ban was announced on Saturday morning prior to Leeds' 2-0 win at home to Queens Park Rangers.

The left-back motioned towards McNamara with his head and the Millwall man appeared to report an injury to the referee at the time and then spoke with him again at full-time.

Farke offers no excuse for Firpo's actions. He requested to address the situation at the end of his post-game press conference against QPR because he suggested that speaking about it would leave him in no mood to discuss football any further.

"First of all it came for us as a shock, no one was aware, I had not noticed anything during the game," he said. "This investigation was also a shock. I've watched it back and Junior has to behave better, we accept the ban. I was not happy with his behaviour. It was an emotional game, in added time, we're in a losing position and McNamara went after him, not the other way round, but he should have went away and not let him provoke a reaction. For a player of his experience, Junior has to behave in a better, more mature way. I'm not happy at all with it."

The German also takes issue with the fact that video footage was used to re-referee the incident, when VAR is not in use in the Championship. "I'm struggling with a few things," he said. "We don't use VAR in this league to make the decisions better, like disallowed goals, red cards, offside. Probably to save some money or whatever, so we play without it. But then we use the TV pictures to find something out, what no one has realised during the game and to investigate if someone has behaved in a difficult way. I'm struggling a bit with this. Especially, where does it start and end? No one realised it. Then when you have the camera on each corner there are five or six fouls and we would finish with five red cards, there is always a foul. We allow TV pictures to investigate."

Farke's second complaint is that he believes there is no consistency between this situation and one last season that left Willy Gnonto with an injury after a challenge from Rotherham United man Lee Peltier.

"The second thing I'm struggling with is the reason I ask the question why was it investigated?" Farke began. "The reason was because the referee reported in his report that the player McNamara came after the game to say there was inappropriate behaviour and a head nick or whatever you call it. That was the reason the referee wrote it in the report and that was the license to investigate.

"Last year in Rotherham there as a clear penalty for us, everyone in the stadium has realised, every TV pundit picked up on it, everyone on social media, the whole staff was claiming for a red. A few days letter we receive a letter saying it should have been a straight red and a penalty, we apologise for this. In this case, Willy Gnonto had a bloody knee, had a bruise and everyone was claiming something has happened. It was not reported in the report of the referee. Why wasn't it reported last season and there was an injury. This time no one realises, there is no injury and one player reports and they write it down? There has to be consistency."

And the manager takes issue with McNamara's decision to report Firpo to the officials when in Farke's eyes there was no injury sustained in the incident.

"The third thing with all respect, if you want to keep going like this it's not my football anymore or my values," he said. "In my generation we tried everything in 90 minutes to be competitive - borderline duels, sometimes you tried to provoke and if it goes in your favour you cheer about it. Whatever happened you shake hands at full-time, give each other a hug and that is it. It would not be possible after I win a game and there were feisty, nasty duels and provoking on both sides, that I report to a referee that there was violent behaviour and there was not even an injury. I have my problems with this behaviour.

"For me it's not the manner how we should be there in terms of football. You shake hands, you say we gave it to each other, everything is okay. But to speak about a colleague doing something wrong, when there is no injury. We haven't done this after fouls on Willy with blood on his knee. I think you shouldn't do this.

"What I'm also struggling with, if we then say this player will be rewarded by booking or suspending the other player because we set up a panel. You will be rewarded, your claim is successful. You've done really well, so report it further on. It's not great how we educate our players. You know why I loved football in England so much? Because whenever a guy was diving the home fans were booing to educate him. If a player reports that a colleague has done a mistake, and he's not injured, then recreate a panel that say great we reward you with a suspension for the other player, we educate our players in the wrong direction."

But Farke insists that he will deal with Firpo privately and offered an apology for the left-back's actions at The Den.

"Having said this, not a good behaviour, I don't like it of Junior, it was wrong," he said. "Both players were losing their arms and legs, bit borderline-ish, McNamara provoked him and Junior should have accepted it and not been so emotional. Overall we accept the ban and be sure internally I will speak about this with Junior pretty strict. It was our mistake, I can just apologise for this, Junior's mistake but all the other points are still valid."