Atletico Madrid have hit back at Jose Mourinho after the Real Madrid manager brought up impressions of two controversial refereeing decisions in the Madrid derby in his post-match press conference.
Mourinho blamed the officials for missing two red card decisions Real’s 2-1 defeat at the Wanda Metropolitano on Sunday.
Atlético have responded in typical style, posting a number of times on their X account, the first being a video showing a sheet of paper coming out of a printer with the words #StopAcosoArbitralYA, which stands for “stop referee harassment now”.
The second then showed a picture of Mourinho at the press conference with the same message, and posted a third time with the message: “This year they have a new challenge. Three weeks without League. This season they start very early.”
It is not the first time Atlético have used their social media account to mock their rivals, with the club repeatedly mocking Barcelona following their failed pursuit of striker Julian Álvarez.
Alongside Mourinho’s post-match claims, the match report published on Real’s website said the derby defeat was decided because of “terrible refereeing” by Ortiz Arias.
Although Mourinho felt the home side should have seen two red cards, it was a Real player who was sent off, with Dean Huijsen sending his marching orders to deny Guiliano Simeone a goal-scoring opportunity.
Alejandro Grimaldo scored from the resulting penalty before Jonathan David made it 2-0 just six minutes later to put Atletico ahead.
Antonio Rudiger reduced the score in the 89th minute, but it did not prevent the Whites from suffering their second defeat in LaLiga this season, with Mourinho’s side already six points behind leaders Barcelona in the table.
Mourinho: The story of the match is right here
“We can skip the press conference because the story of the match is right here,” Mourinho said as he showed the media pictures printed on A4 sheets of paper on Sunday.
“They were two clear red cards. Considering the difficulties we encountered after playing 11v10, we can only imagine what 50 minutes of 11v9 would have been like.
“So I’ll just have to hug my players, who gave everything and played a great first half, showed great class and character and set us up perfectly to win the second half.”
Simeone, when asked to respond to Mourinho’s refereeing, said he was always respectful of others’ opinions.
“I understand that we are in a privileged position with a lot of public scrutiny, as coaches, and whether it’s Mourinho, (Barcelona coach Hansi) Flick, (Real Betis coach Manuel) Pellegrini, me or anyone else, we have to be careful with what we say,” he said.
“We have to know how to respect others, the referees, our teammates. And when someone crosses that line of respect, it’s not okay, you can’t cross that line.”