Mourinho files lawsuit against Galatasaray after racist remark accusation

Jose Mourinho has filed a lawsuit against Galatasaray after the club accused him of making racist remarks following Monday’s Istanbul derby.

The Fenerbahçe manager faced allegations from Galatasaray over his post-match comments, but his club swiftly defended him, stating on Tuesday that his words had been “completely taken out of context.”

On Friday, Fenerbahçe announced that Mourinho, through the club’s legal team, was suing Galatasaray for 1,907,000 Turkish Lira, approximately £41,000, citing an “attack on his personal rights.” The figure is symbolic, representing the year Fenerbahçe was founded in 1907.

During his post-match press conference after the 0-0 draw, Mourinho criticized the home bench for “jumping like monkeys” and reiterated his disapproval of Turkish referees, stating that appointing a local official would have been a “disaster.” The match had been officiated by Slovenian referee Slavko Vinčić after both clubs requested a foreign referee.

On Thursday, the Turkish Football Federation handed Mourinho a four-match ban and fined him £35,194 for two separate disciplinary infractions.

The TFF said it was penalising him for “his derogatory and offensive statements towards the Turkish referee” and because he “accused Turkish football of chaos and disorder with insulting and offensive statements towards both the Turkish football community and all Turkish referees”.

His comments included him saying that “after the big dive in the first minute and their bench jumping like monkeys on the top of the kid… with a Turkish referee you would have a yellow card after one minute and after five minutes I would have to change [substitute] him”.

The TFF said “the statements used towards the members of the opposing team were contrary to the ethics of sports and the concept of fair play, contained expressions that could encourage violence and disorder in sports, were divisive and separatist in society and could cause fan incidents”.