Tottenham’s Cristian Romero handed extra one-match suspension

LONDON (AP) — Tottenham’s Cristian Romero was suspended for one extra match and fined 50,000 pounds ($67,000) on Friday following his sending off against Liverpool last month.

The Argentina defender admitted a charge of “failing to leave the field of play promptly and/or behaving in a confrontational and/or aggressive manner towards the referee” late in Spurs’ 2-1 loss on Dec. 20.

Romero kicked out at Liverpool’s Ibrahima Konate, earning a second yellow card of the match. He received an automatic one-match suspension for that incident.

The ban comes in a week when he made more headlines after posting a long message on Instagram in which he apologized to fans for Tottenham’s results and went in hard on unspecified people at the club.

“At times like this, it should be other people coming out to speak, but they don’t — as has been happening for several years now,” he wrote. “They only show up when things are going well. We’ll stay here, working, sticking together and giving our all to turn things around. Especially at times like this, keeping quiet, working harder and moving forward all together, is part of football.”

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