Marta’s Retirement with a Red Card, Two-Game Suspension and a Silver Medal

Brazil’s football captain, Marta Vieira da Silva, could not escape the two-match suspension since the appeal filed by her along with the Brazilian Olympic Committee and the Brazilian Football Confederation was dismissed by the Court of Arbitration for Sports (CAS). As a result, she missed the quarterfinals against hosts France and the semifinals, against Spain.

The player had committed a high tackle by raising her leg with cleats up, partially hitting the opposing player, which the referee reported as a category H offence and issued a red card. The incident constituted a potential breach of Article 14.1(e) of the FIFA Disciplinary Code (FDC), and the proposed sanction in accordance with Article 58 of the FDC was a two-match suspension, including an automatic suspension following her sending off during the match.

In their appeal, the applicants submitted that the incident did not fall under Article 14.1(e) of the FDC as it did not amount to a “serious foul play.”. The player was not careless or reckless and had no intention to harm anyone. Furthermore, the opponent did not suffer any injury and continued playing in the match. They claimed that the incident should be categorised as “unsporting behaviour” under Article 14.1(b) and the sanction must be reduced to a one match suspension, including the automatic suspension.

The arbitrator found that, in order to change the qualification of the offense from “serious fouls play” to “unsporting behaviour”, she would have to review the conclusions drawn by the referee and match officials and that such conclusions constituted field of play decisions. To overturn a field of play decision, there must be direct evidence that establishes a ‘high hurdle’, bad faith or bias. Since none of these special circumstances applied to the case, the Sole Arbitrator did not find merit in applying Article 14.1(b) instead of Article 14.1(e).

It is notable that six-time Olympian and Brazil’s highest ever goal scorer, Marta, had announced her retirement from International Football at the end of 2024 prior to the Paris Olympics which added a second silver medal to her list of accolades.