The FA dismiss Jose Mourinho's claims

Jose Mourinho

The English FA has dismissed Jose Mourinho's claims that his English was a factor in the criticism of officials that earned him a £50 000 fine and a suspended one-match stadium ban.

Mourinho was sanctioned by the FA last week for saying referee Robert Madley had been "afraid" to award a penalty in Chelsea's 3-1 loss to Southampton on October 3.

The Chelsea manager described the fine as a "disgrace" and the prospect of a stadium ban as "absolutely astonishing".

But the FA on Monday published the independent regulatory commission's written reasons for the punishments, which Mourinho last week said he would appeal against.

Mourinho did not attend a hearing, instead representing himself in writing. He admitted the charge, but denied questioning the integrity of Madley.

The three-man panel rejected that assertion and also threw out Mourinho's comments on English not being his first language.

"His English is far too sophisticated for that to affect our conclusion, as the interviews themselves demonstrate," the written reasons said.

Mourinho bemoaned the perceived inconsistency between his calling Madley "afraid" and Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger's criticism of referee Mike Dean as "weak" and "naive", which went unpunished, but that claim was also rejected by the FA.

"Mr Mourinho's comments in this case were so clearly on the wrong side of the line that there is no need to go into this issue at all. It is no mitigation for Mr Mourinho," the three-man panel said.

"It appears to us that increasing levels of fine are not on their own going to be a reliable deterrent for Mr Mourinho against improper comments to the media.

"We have in mind particularly that the more than doubling of the January 2015 fine as compared with the May 2014 fine has not deterred him from this latest and more serious breach.

"In our judgement the fair way to impose this deterrent is to suspend the ban so that Mr Mourinho is able quite easily to avoid its ever coming into effect. The matter is in his hands. All he has to do is refrain from any further breach by media comments for the next 12 months, whereupon the ban will expire completely."

Source.supersport.com