“Sporting President Frederico Varandas calls for Independent Refereeing in Portuguese Football”

Present at the launch of the book ‘We are all part – 10 years of opinion’, by Luciano Gonçalves, president of the Portuguese Association of Football Referees (APAF), Frederico Varandas fought for a «deep reform» in refereeing to avoid the referee conditioning.

«As president of Sporting, I defend a truly independent refereeing class, and when I say independent, I mean independent from clubs, the big ones, from Sporting, from any club. I defend an arbitration that will obviously force a profound reform, but I defend that it is possible to remove arbitration from under the jurisdiction of the Federation – and I am not questioning any personal issue with the presidents. I think we should defend a more independent, more transparent system and ensure that referees are not indirectly conditioned by any club», asked the top leader of the lions, looking at what is being done outside.

“It is essential for Portuguese football to see these examples. The best of them is the Premier League, we don’t have to be ashamed or afraid but courage to copy what’s good. And in the Premier League we have independent refereeing, completely outside the sphere of clubs. I don’t want any president to be able to condition referees or my rivals to be able to do it», concluded Frederico Varandas.