The Sporting Judge has confirmed that Strahinja Pavlovic will be suspended for Sunday’s game between Lecce and AC Milan.
The surprise news from the press release is that Mike Maignan will be banned for one game because of something he said to the referee in the tunnel after the full-time whistle, but Pavlovic will also be suspended for one round.
The Serbian centre-back will not make the trip to Lecce for the game on Saturday 8 March at 18:00 at the Stadio via Del Mare. He was sent off midway through the second half during the 2-1 defeat to Lazio on Sunday night.
What is surprising, however, is the reason why Pavlovic was sent off. The two options could have been DOGSO – Denial of an Obvious Goal Scoring Opportunity (i.e. a player through on goal as the last man) or serious foul play.
The following reason is stated in the press release: “[…] For committing a foul on an opponent who had a clear goal scoring opportunity.” A reason that casts even more doubt on Manganiello’s decision, given the four criteria that must be met for a DOGSO.
The first is possession of the ball, the second is distance from the goal, the third is number of defenders and the fourth is direction of play. In the Pavlovic incident, at least two of these criteria are missing: the distance from the goal was still considerable and there were one if not two covering defenders.
