Portugal’s football federation has suspended Cristiano Ronaldo for 30 days and fined him €255 after he left the national team camp before the Nations League match in Denmark. It is the minimum penalty available, and Ronaldo will be eligible when Portugal return to action in November.
Lisbon, Portugal: The punishment arrives three weeks after a walkout that rattled the national team, and it sits at the bottom of the range. The federation’s disciplinary council found the 41-year-old captain guilty of one intentional disciplinary infraction under Article 160(1) of its regulations, then chose a suspension of one month on a scale that ran to six.
A minimum sanction
The ruling, announced on Monday, 19 October, came from the council’s non-professional section. Alongside the 30-day suspension it imposed a fine of 2.5 units of account, which Portuguese outlets put at €255. Ronaldo had already been provisionally suspended while the case was investigated, and AFP reported that the 30 days are counted from the day of the Denmark match, so the ban will run out by the end of October. The agency also reported that the council took into account the remorse in his statement of 6 October.
From the bench in Oslo to a walkout in Copenhagen
The trouble began on 27 September, when Ronaldo warmed up in the second half of Portugal’s win over Norway and never came on. Three days later, on 30 September and the day before the match in Denmark, he left the camp in Copenhagen shortly after coach Jorge Jesus’s press conference, without training with his team-mates.
Ronaldo explained himself in his 6 October statement. He apologised to his team-mates, accused Jesus of breaking his word over playing time, said he would accept whatever the federation decided and insisted he was not retiring from international football. Portugal, meanwhile, carried on without him. They won all four of their Nations League matches to date, top Group A on 12 points and are already into the quarter-finals.
Back for November?
Federation president Pedro Proença has said the federation, the coach and the players all want Ronaldo back, and he expects the captain to return in the November window. The calendar offers two chances. Portugal host Denmark on 14 November and face Wales on 17 November in their last two group games, and AFP reported that Ronaldo will be eligible for both. Whether he is selected is Jesus’s decision.
In the meantime Ronaldo, Portugal’s all-time leading scorer and record appearance-maker, keeps playing for Al Nassr, where he scored his 981st career goal last week.
The ruling settles the disciplinary question. What it leaves open is whether a coach and a captain who have given different accounts of the same dispute can work together again when Portugal next gather.
