Bonucci given two-match ban; to miss Juventus game

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Bengaluru, October 25: AC Milan defender Leonardo Bonucci has been suspended for two matches following his red card during Sunday's (October 22) 0-0 draw against Genoa, ruling him out of Wednesday's match against Chievo and as well as a high voltage clash with his former club Juventus this end of the week.

Bonucci was shown a straight red card after a review from the video assistant referee spotted him hitting Genoa's Aleandro Rosi with his elbow while both of them were battling for the ball. Although mostly a straight red punishes a player with three-match suspension, however, Serie A's disciplinary committee did not term it as a violent of conduct and only banned him for two games.

After the elbowing, opponent Rosi had to have stitches on his injury. However, Bonucci later made an apology for the incident and claimed that he will not appeal for any review to lessen the suspension.

"I'm sorry for what happened. I certainly didn't want to hurt Rosi, I just wanted to free myself from him and everybody has seen what happened," he told Mediaset. "I apologised to him at the end of the game and I'm really sorry for what happened.

"Having said that, I'll accept the verdict. We're in a technological era and freeze-framing can lead to this kind of evaluation. I'll miss the game against Juventus and I'm sad about that, but it was clearly destiny. I have faith in my team-mates to give me something to smile about.

"We need points because the league table shows that we're losing too many, but with 10 men on Sunday, we saw the real Milan, with character, which you need to respond to your critics."

The 30-year-old left Juventus after seven years in a shocking move to their league rival AC Milan for €42million this summer and has played matches for his team in the league this season, holding the captain's armband.

The Rossoneri's season is not going as per expectation and the Milan based side are currently facing a huge amount of pressure to deliver results. They have won only four matches in the Serie A among nine, and currently sits at the 11th position, nine points behind fourth-placed Lazio and are already 12 points behind leaders Napoli.

Manager Montella is also currently feeling the pressure of delivering results and there are also rumours circulating of him getting the sack and if some of the reports are to be believed the match against Juventus this week could be a make or break time for him.