{"id":36359,"date":"2026-10-18T06:16:49","date_gmt":"2026-10-18T06:16:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/vinicius-junior-from-contract-uncertainty-to-conspiracy-theories-and-a-four-match-ban\/"},"modified":"2026-10-18T06:16:49","modified_gmt":"2026-10-18T06:16:49","slug":"vinicius-junior-from-contract-uncertainty-to-conspiracy-theories-and-a-four-match-ban","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/vinicius-junior-from-contract-uncertainty-to-conspiracy-theories-and-a-four-match-ban\/","title":{"rendered":"Vinicius Junior: From contract uncertainty to conspiracy theories and a four-match ban"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">A key moment was when Jose Mourinho opted to start the Brazilian on the bench for the match against Villarreal, their first since the international break.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">It was the first time since last April that Vinicius had not started a match for the club, with Mourinho handing Yan Diomande a place in the starting XI instead.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;What makes me sad is the fact he really wants to be at his absolute best,&#8221; Mourinho said beforehand.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;He wants to be the Vini who wins games, scores goals and makes the difference. Seeing the pain he feels himself makes me sad. He is an extraordinary guy who works very hard to get back to his absolute best.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;He deserves better treatment, as he has made Madrid very happy on many occasions.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Vinicius has been continually booed and whistled by some Real Madrid supporters this season, along with other players. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">After entering the game in the 52nd minute he looked to have made an immediate impact, scoring what Real believed to be their second goal after a Jude Bellingham assist.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Vinicius raced towards the supporters, kissing the badge before being engulfed by his team-mates, who piled on top of him in celebration.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Even Mourinho sprinted across the pitch to join the celebrations, which felt like a public display of his faith in the Brazilian.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">A VAR review changed everything.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The referee was sent to the monitor, which showed Vinicius pulling Nathan Saliba&#8217;s hair while the ball was in play and neither player was challenging for it.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The referee overturned the goal and instead showed Vinicius a straight red card.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The Brazilian&#8217;s reaction to the decision then became a further disciplinary issue, with team-mates having to intervene as he continued to protest.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Mourinho refused to speak to press afterwards. News travelled around the media room that Mourinho felt if he did speak, he would say something that would get him suspended.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/sport\/football\/articles\/cqj9k38x7x1xo?at_medium=RSS&#038;at_campaign=rss\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A key moment was when Jose Mourinho opted to start the Brazilian on the bench for the match against Villarreal, their first since the international break. It was the first time since last April that Vinicius had not started a match for the club, with Mourinho handing Yan Diomande a place in the starting XI [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":36360,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19,18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-36359","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-european-football","category-world-sport"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36359","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36359"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36359\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":36361,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36359\/revisions\/36361"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/36360"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36359"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36359"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/sport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36359"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}