Argentine Soccer Club Suspended A Year And Relegated After Savagely Beating Three Referees

Late last month, Juventud de Pergamino hosted Independiente de Chivilcoy in an Argentine lower-division match. During the game, the head referee showed a Juventud player a justified red card. This event sparked a massive brawl in which a number of Juventud players and fans attacked the three referees, beating them down in gruesome fashion.

Here’s another angle of the attack:

Marcelo Acosta, one of the line judges whose wounded head can be seen on the left side of the above video’s thumbnail, told local reporters that he was reconsidering his refereeing career after the incident. While Acosta suffered a nasty gash on the back of his head, he said both the head ref and the other linesman suffered more serious injuries. Because of their head injuries, neither of Acosta’s referee companions remember much from the attack, he said. Here is a graphic picture of the head ref after the attack:

Argentina’s soccer authorities opened an investigation into the matter and have now come down with their punishment. Juventud as a club has been suspended from competition until the start of the 2019 season, and will be relegated from Argentina’s fourth tier to the fifth division when they do return to the pitch. In addition, two coaches and two players involved in the fight have received individual suspensions ranging from two to three years.

[ Olé]