Cunha glasses offer helps reduce punishment

Matheus Cunha's offer to pay for new glasses for a member of Ipswich's security helped save him from a longer ban and heavier fine.

The Wolves striker was suspended for two games and given an £80,000 fine after clashing with a member of the Tractor Boys' security team last month.

He had been charged by the Football Association with misconduct following the altercation - where he snatched the glasses off the face of a security guard - at the final whistle of Wolves' 2-1 defeat at Molineux.

A regulatory commission initially considered hitting the 25-year-old with a £120,000 fine and a three game ban.

But in their written reasons the commission agreed Cunha's acceptance of the charge, his sincere personal apology and the offer to pay for new glasses were mitigating factors.

It also wrote: "The Commission unanimously agreed that a significant financial penalty was also appropriate, given the serious nature of the incident.

"It initially considered that a fine of £120,000 would be commensurate with the offence. However, it took account of the mitigating factors and decided to apply a similar 'discount' to that applied to the sporting sanction. It concluded that a fine of £80,000 would be appropriate."

In his witness statement Cunha explained his reasons, although the commission did not accept his version of events having studied the video evidence.

Tempers flared after Jack Taylor's injury-time header won the game for the visitors. Gary O'Neil was sacked as Wolves boss less than 24 hours later.

Cunha wrote: "As I tried to get closer to Rayan [Ait-Nouri] to make sure he was OK, I was suddenly surrounded by a lot of people. I felt like I was being shoved by the ITFC security personnel, so I shoved them back in an effort to break away from them to protect myself.

"It was never my intention to come into contact with Mr [redacted] and I certainly never meant to elbow him. I simply wanted to push him away from Rayan. Then all of a sudden, I remember Mr [redacted] turned round and had his hands on my shirt, and I shouted 'stop' but he kept hold of my shirt.

"I was surrounded by a large number of people, mainly ITFC personnel, so I remember feeling quite threatened at the time."