Jose Mourinho 'f*cked up' with 'clumsy' Vinicius Junior comments as ex-Chelsea pupil urges Benfica boss to apologise

The European contest in question was halted for 10 minutes shortly after Blancos forward Vini had opened the scoring in spectacular fashion. He celebrated by the corner flag in front of agitated home supporters, before making his way back towards the halfway line - picking up a yellow card in the process.

Prior to play resuming, Vinicius raced towards the referee to lodge a complaint. Prestianni, with his shirt pulled up to cover his mouth, is alleged to have made racist comments. UEFA has announced that the Argentine will be provisionally banned for one game - ruling him out of a knockout phase play-off return date at Santiago Bernabeu - as investigations continue.

Prestianni denies the allegations being made against him - stating that he used a homophobic slur against Vinicius, rather than a racist one - and Mourinho claimed after an eventful contest at Estadio da Luz that Real’s superstar winger had acted in an antagonistic manner.

He said at the time: “When you score a goal like that, you celebrate in a respectful way. The words they exchange, Prestianni with Vinicius, I want to be independent. I don't comment about it.

“When he was arguing about racism I told him the biggest person in the history of this club was black [Eusebio]. This club, the last thing it is is racist, so if in his mind it was something in relation to that, this is Benfica. There is something wrong because it happens in every stadium. Every stadium that Vinicius plays [in] something happens. Always.”

Ex-Nigeria international Mikel, who played under Mourinho at Premier League giants Chelsea, has told his Obi One Podcast: “What I expected to hear from my old boss, from my gaffer [was] ‘Yes it is under investigation, but there is not place for racism there, there is no place for such thing, but let’s wait until it is concluded, there is no place for that’.

“So for him to come out and say ‘Oh yeah, Vinicius Jr shouldn’t have celebrated the way he did’, that was a clumsy, clumsy comment from Jose Mourinho. He will be the first, he knows, he will be the first to know ‘I’ve f*cked up here’. He is a smart, smart guy, a very smart guy, he knows.”

Mikel added: “I don’t know the reason why he hasn’t apologised, but I expect him to come out at some point and make a statement. There is nobody who has played with Jose Mourinho that has a bad word to say about him, especially when it comes to racism, especially, zero, absolutely zero.

“He will be the first to say ‘I f*cked up, it was after the game, emotions were running high, I didn’t think about my statement, I didn’t think about what I was going to say’. He is an experienced manager, he is a smart guy, he knows what he should have said. The statement that he made is a massive, massive, huge mistake.”

Mourinho has refused to discuss the incident since, saying when asked about the backlash to his post-match interviews: “I don't want to comment. I repeat that it has been difficult for everyone, I won't specify the level of difficulty. Today we were all able to be professional and do our job.”

He will not host a pre-match press conference this week ahead of Benfica’s trip to Madrid as he is serving a touchline ban after being shown a red card in Lisbon. Prestianni will also be absent from that fixture, with it possible that - if found guilty - the 20-year-old Argentine will be stung with a 10-match suspension by European football’s governing body.