In an interview with DAZN, Bayern Munich director Eberl questioned the DFB's punishment against Ulreich as too harsh. Last week, Ulreich was penalized by the DFB with a one-game Bundesliga suspension and a €20,000 fine after making insulting remarks about Leverkusen's sporting director Rolfes during Bayern's match against Leverkusen.
Commenting on this, Eberle said, "The penalty seems a bit excessive. Let's look back at similar cases in the past, for example, De Bruyne once insulted a ball boy but he was only punished with a fine." The incident he referred to with De Bruyne took place in 2015, when De Bruyne, who was playing for Wolfsburg, uttered the insulting words, "Give me the ball, you stupid X," to a 16-year-old ball boy, resulting in a fine of only 20,000 euros and no suspension.
Eberle's comments have sparked a discussion about the consistency of disciplinary standards in soccer. Some people believe that there should be a uniform and fair set of punishment standards for players or coaches for their actions and words on and off the field. This time, Ulreich's punishment does seem to be more severe compared to De Bruyne's previous case, which makes Bayern Munich side feel dissatisfied.
However, it has also been pointed out that the specific circumstances of each case are different and simple analogies cannot be drawn. The German Football Association (DFB) takes into account a number of factors, including the identity of the person concerned, the seriousness of the remarks and the social impact, when making a decision on punishment. Therefore, although Ulreich and De Bruyne were both penalized with fines, their specific circumstances and the consequences they faced were not exactly the same.
