Jose Mourinho
Roma manager Jose Mourinho has asked to step down his role on the UEFA football board, European football’s governing body confirmed to ESPN on Friday.
It comes less than two days after Mourinho was banned for his team’s next four European games by UEFA for verbally abusing referee Anthony Taylor after last month’s Europa League final.
Roma lost a penalty shootout to Sevilla after a 1-1 draw and following the match, footage circulated of Mourinho approaching Taylor and yelling expletives in his direction outside the stadium.
As first reported by The Athletic, Mourinho sent a letter to UEFA which read: “In thanking you for the invitation you extended to me to be a member of the UEFA football board, I regret to inform you that, effective immediately, I will be renouncing my participation in this group.
“The conditions which I so strongly believed in when I joined are no longer standing and I felt the obligation to take this decision.
“I kindly ask that you also communicate my decision to the President Mr. Aleksander Ceferin.”
Mourinho is set to serve the ban in next season’s Europa League group stage after being found guilty of “directing abusive language at a match official,” UEFA said in a statement announcing its disciplinary panel’s verdict.
The ban is double the minimum two-game ban required by UEFA disciplinary rules.
One day after the final, Taylor and his family were harassed by Roma fans at the airport in Budapest.
UEFA also fined Roma €50,000 ($55,000) and will block the club from selling tickets for their next away game in the Europa League. The charges included “lighting of fireworks, throwing of objects, acts of damage and crowd disturbances.”