Stand: 21.05.2023
In the middle of the Müller interview, referee Aytekin freaked out
FC Bayern loses against Leipzig and no longer has the championship in their own hands. But not only the players of the record champions are eaten up after the game. Referee Deniz Aytekin railed against an ex-colleague in the catacombs.
After FC Bayern’s defeat by Leipzig, referee Aytekin had a tantrum in the catacombs. His curses are aimed at ex-colleague Manuel Gräfe. He now shoots back and accuses Aytekin of having acted in a calculated manner.
Ex referee Manuel Graefe has defended his criticism of a decision by Deniz Aytekin in the Bayern Munich game against RB Leipzig (1: 3) and accused his former colleague of a calculated outburst of anger.
The 49-year-old Gräfe wrote on Twitter on Sunday that it was a “media distraction maneuver” that Aytekin had reacted “spontaneously emotionally” in the interview and put it in quotation marks. In his opinion, Aytekin wanted to “distract referee problems” and prevent “legitimate inquiries”.
As an expert on ZDF, Gräfe had criticized a decision by Aytekin. The 44-year-old then said about Gräfe that he was “sitting in Berlin with his 180 kilos and talking such shit and that’s slowly going against the grain.” This is madness.”
He received encouragement from his colleague Felix Brych at Sport1: “I don’t think it’s good what Manu is doing either. Refereeing is a special job. Deniz was also about an incredible amount. Manu knows what it means to whistle such a game. I don’t like the fact that he’s currently picking one out every week.”
Ex-referee Manuel Gräfe
Quelle: pa/dpa/Boris Roessler
Aytekin later publicly apologized to BILD for his choice of words, including Gräfe, and announced that he would donate 5,000 euros to “A Heart for Children”. A “long apology came via SMS,” wrote Gräfe on Twitter.
Gräfe now explained: “My comments are factual.” At the same time, the Berliner criticized that the German football referees did not have a uniform line, among other things, when interpreting the handball rule. One can “always and especially in individual cases have a different opinion”. However, it is the case that many top referees would see a missing line, judged Gräfe in a long thread on Twitter that included seven entries.
Graefe’s post in full
- Aytekin obviously couldn’t/wouldn’t respond to legitimate questions yesterday
- Distracting problems + silencing justified inquiries (!) from a ZDF reporter (wasn’t my tweet – it was only later #dopa) about decisions by creating a headwind. The reactions to inquiries/comments from Aytekin+Brych show that other opinions will not
- accepted + the ranks close outwards-internally it looks completely different. It doesn’t get any better than that. You can always and especially in individual cases have a different opinion – in general, almost everyone, including many top SRs, sees it in such a way that the line is missing! That Ittrich’s personal attack
- nor approves, questionable, who otherwise likes to act morally. My comments are factual: Even a hold first right before an execution that would lead to a repetition + no goal should be allowed to be discussed professionally. Especially compared to #BSCBOC +others.
- It’s about missing line (even with hand). As expressed in the #Sporstudio, both decisions #FCBRBL #BSCBOC were justifiable for me. Aytekin’s handball not – he showed arm wide from the body – was the other. The forearm was hit directly in front of the body: unintentionally +
- without widening. But all of this has a history. After the Classico, Brych criticized Aytekin internally in front of the DFB SR at a conference in Frankfurt that Aytekin should not whistle the Classico with empathy and that Gräfe could. Sting seemed to be deep+desired distraction…
- Confusing pounds with kilos (91 at 1.97) happens when you say you’re at 180. That’s where you get confused. A long apology came via SMS, but who should decide where the donation (from Aytekin) goes to? Let’s continue
