Bruno Fernandes has been accused of being "embarrassing" and "out of control" during Manchester United's victory over Liverpool on Monday night.
The Portugal star wore the captain's armband for the victory, which came via goals from Jadon Sancho and Marcus Rashford. Regular club captain Harry Maguire was dropped for the game, with Raphael Varane partnering Lisandro Martinez in central defence.
Fernandes was spotted in conversation with Liverpool boss Jurgen Klopp after the game, having appeared to anger the German with some of his antics. However, while Klopp played down the significance of the chat, the midfielder's dive and apparent time-wasting clearly angered others such as former Chelsea striker Tony Cascarino.
"Fernandes takes antisocial behaviour on the pitch to a whole new level, and it all feels so cynical, and so premeditated," Cascarino wrote for The Times. The former Sporting CP man was booked for a dive in the Liverpool area, but referee Michael Oliver declined to show him a second yellow card for delaying the restart after Mohamed Salah pulled a goal back for the visitors.
"We’ve all seen players do this before, but Fernandes must have set a new record for how long he held on to the ball," the Irish international continued. "It was as clear a yellow card for ungentlemanly conduct as you will ever see, but Oliver appeared unprepared to show it, presumably on the basis it would mean sending Fernandes off."
Cascarino also suggested the leniency shown by Oliver could prompt more of the same from the 27-year-old, while also pointing out that Fernandes has picked up more yellows for dissent than any other Premier League player since he arrived from Sporting in January 2020. " Bruno Fernandes ’s gamesmanship is getting out of control, and Michael Oliver’s strange reluctance to send him off against Liverpool on Monday will only encourage Fernandes to behave even worse in the future," he wrote.
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Klopp's emotional back-and-forth with Fernandes also attracted attention. However, as the former Dortmund boss explained, this was more to do with some of the midfielder's other behaviour during the game.
"It was not animated it was the most harmless conversation I ever had with a player, who was obviously as emotional as I was," the manager told reporters in his post-match press conference. "It was the situation with Martinez, who went down under an 'awful' tackle that was obviously nothing.
"He [Fernandes] made a bit of it, he was talking to me and saying, ‘you'd do the same’. But it was fine after, he told me he needs these kind of conversations. Okay, it’s fine, use me!"
