Two key players of Napoli, Goran Pandev and Andrea Dossena, have been banned for two matches due to their behaviour in the final of the Italian Super Cup against Juventus. Apart from these two, Juan Zuniga has also been banned for 1 match. Zuniga and Pandev had to leave the field towards the end of the second half of the match. Pandev was shown the red card and Zuniga was shown the second yellow card. Due to this, Napoli was reduced to nine players in the extra time which proved to be very costly for the team. Napoli lost the match by 3-2 and Juventus won the Italian Super Cup.
According to the reports, Pandev didn’t use the right kind of language for the match referee. While, Dossena tried to bully an assistant referee at the end of the match. As a result, they have been banned. The Napoli team wasn’t happy with some of the decisions made by the referee during the match. So, the Napoli players didn’t take part in the presentation ceremony after the match. The players didn’t even collect their runner up medals. According to some reports, Napoli might be punished for boycotting the presentation ceremony. This would be an additional blow for the club.
Meanwhile, the authorities of Napoli have made it clear that they are not happy with the ban on their key players and they would appeal against the ban. The lawyer of the club, Mattia Grassani, told the reporters that he has a meeting with Aurelio De Laurentiis, the president of Napoli. The president is pretty unhappy with the adjudication of the disciplinary committee and he has given clear instructions to lodge the appeal. As per Grassani, he needs a Xerox copy of the report of the match referee in order to lodge the appeal. He has requested for it and once he gets that, he would proceed further.