After the 2-0 defeat at VfL Wolfsburg, coach Dino Toppmöller and offensive player Mario Götze from Eintracht Frankfurt complained massively about the sending off of the 2014 world champion.
“It’s crazy to me how the referees treat Mario. I think he doesn’t deserve the way he’s treated,” said Toppmöller. “He gets whistled against him relatively rarely. But it feels like referees are waiting so that they can give him a yellow card straight away.”
The 31-year-old Götze was shown a yellow-red card in Wolfsburg in the 58th minute when the score was 0-1. He received a yellow card shortly before half-time because he prevented VfL captain Maximilian Arnold from taking a free kick (42′).
“I can’t understand the first card. It was very questionable,” said Götze himself in a “Sky” interview. He was then sent off for a foul on Mattias Svanberg from Wolfsburg. “The second was a yellow card, we don’t need to talk about that,” admitted Toppmöller.
The new Frankfurt coach said of Götze: “He simply deserves more respect from the referees.”
And: “I just have to protect him because Mario just wants to take on more responsibility after the departure of many offensive players. From his side, too, he may have to control himself a little more when it comes to yellow cards for complaining. But it’s important to me that “He can go to the referee and express his displeasure. That’s part of it. He’s one of our leading players.”