Retro GIF: The Assault On Lothar Matthaus That Saw Real Madrid’s Juanito Banned For Five Years, 1988

Chris Wright

29th, November 2011

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By Chris Wright

Back in 1988, when football was a man’s game, Real Madrid’s Juanito was (perhaps unsurprisingly) banned for five whole years for this brazen double-whammy, back-stamping, cheek-mashing assault on Bayern Munich’s Lothar Matthaus as the German midfielder lay pole-axed between the legs of the referee…

Yeesh.

Despite a career and talent overshadowed by acts of irrational aggression and lengthy bans (he was once suspended for two years for headbutting a referee who had the temerity to let an offside goal stand against Madrid), Juanito is still held up as an icon of the club’s ferocity at the Bernabeu – with the Madrid ultras chanting his name in the 7th minute of every home game following his death in a car accident in 1992.