Melbourne Victory midfielder Zinédine Machach has received a two-game ban from Football Australia’s independent Match Review Panel (MRP) for a straight red card incident in his side’s penalty-shootout win over Melbourne City on Sunday night.
Victory progressed to the Semi-Finals via a dramatic 1-1 (3-2) shootout win in Sunday’s Elimination Final, despite trailing 1-0 before Machach received his marching orders for violent conduct, after kicking out at City winger Leo Natel.
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The MRP considered the incident on Monday afternoon and concluded Machach had committed the offence of “Assault on a player (e.g. violent conduct when not challenging for the ball) or against any other person other than a Match Official, including an attempted Assault”.
After reviewing the incident, the MRP dealt Machach the minimum two-game ban, ruling him out for both legs of Victory’s Semi-Final bout with Wellington Phoenix.
Victory accepted the MRP’s two-game ban for Machach.
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The MRP also considered red cards to Macarthur defender Kealey Adamson and City centre-back Curtis Good, handing one-game suspensions to both players for their respective send-offs.
Macarthur lost 4-0 to Sydney FC in Saturday’s Elimination Final, meaning Adamson’s one-game ban for “Denying the opposing team an obvious goal-scoring opportunity, as prescribed in Law 12 of the Laws of the Game” will carry over to the next Isuzu UTE A-League or Australia Cup game in which Macarthur participates.
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Good’s one-game suspension for collecting two yellow cards in Melbourne Derby defeat to Victory also carries into the next campaign due to City’s elimination from the Finals Series.
