Carlos Tevez’s adviser has opened a new front in the explosive dispute over whether the Manchester City striker refused to take the field during a Champions League tie at Bayern Munich by claiming the player’s post-match comments were mistranslated.
Kia Joorabchian, Tevez’s adviser who once owned the Argentinian’s economic rights, said the questions to the player and his answers in a televised interview with Sky had been mistranslated by a member of City’s backroom staff who was acting as an interpreter. But although an independent translation from Tevez’s answer in Spanish is different from the one supplied on the night, it still appears to suggest that he did refuse to take the field.
After the City manager, Roberto Mancini, had angrily claimed the £45m striker had refused to come on as a substitute and would never play for the club again, Tevez’s post-match comment to Sky’s Geoff Shreeves was translated by the interpreter – chosen by the player for the task – as «I did not feel right to play, so I did not».
Joorabchian, whose intervention has come while City’s investigation into the incident is ongoing, told the Leaders in Football conference in London that Tevez was not the sort of player who would refuse to take to the pitch. «When questions are asked right after the game, things are put out of context,» Joorabchian said. «If you don’t have a very professional interpreter then you have a problem. I speak Spanish and I speak English. I listened to the questions in English and I listened to the interpretation in Spanish and the interpretation was incorrect; it was a different interpretation.
«Both questions were interpreted incorrectly and both answers of Carlos were misinterpreted. The way the interpreter presented it, Geoff Shreeves says something like: ‘What is the truth, Carlos?’ He refers to the point where the fighting has occurred and Mancini says Carlos is finished. Carlos then says the truth is that in this point in time how am I going to be in a mental state to play? But the interpreter says something very different.»
A later independent translation obtained by Sky Sports News appears to confirm that Tevez was talking about his decision not to go on to the pitch, rather than whether he was finished at City. «I didn’t want to warm up because I wasn’t feeling very well so I thought it was better not to,» the translation said. «So I didn’t think I was in a good situation to come on because my head wasn’t in the right place.»
The Tevez camp is expected to try to back up its argument that there was confusion over the initial translation by pointing to footage which it says shows the interpreter moving away at the beginning of the interview and having to be pulled back by the player.
Tevez has been suspended for two weeks and fined £500,000 by Manchester City. An internal investigation is under way and Tevez has been interviewed. He is in Buenos Aires with the club’s permission and is expected to return to Manchester early next week and to training on Thursday, with the results of the club’s investigation due around the same time.
Tevez is thought to have told City that although he refused to warm up, having already done so twice, he never refused to go on to the pitch.
«What happened on the bench in Munich was one of a lot of confusion as shown on the TV footage,» said Joorabchian. «The events of Munich have been judged prior to the real outcome coming out.
«We see Nigel de Jong going on and Carlos still warming up and a God-awful row between Roberto Mancini and Edin Dzeko. You see this row carrying on and Carlos sits down. Carlos then stands up, there’s more shouting and he sits back down. The next thing we hear is what Roberto says.»
The day after the match, which City lost 2-0, Tevez issued a statement in which he said there was «some confusion on the bench» and he believed his position may have been misunderstood. In the statement, which Joorabchian said he did not see before it was released, Tevez insisted he had not refused to go on.
Joorabchian, who brought Tevez to Corinthians when his company MSI owned the club and then facilitated moves to West Ham and Manchester United, said that the striker would never refuse to play.
«I know Carlos in a totally different light to the way people in this room or around the world know him.
«I know that since he was an 18-year-old boy, you can criticise Carlos for anything but the one thing you can’t criticise him for is his commitment on the pitch and you can never criticise him for [not] wanting to play,» he said.
«There have been several times at Manchester City where he’s taken injections, played with swollen ankles, played in situations where doctors have told him not to play. Carlos has throughout his career been one that fights to play.»
He said Tevez resented the idea that he was controlled by Joorabchian or anyone else.
«Any person who knows Carlos knows he has a very strong opinion on everything. He sometimes resents the fact people think he can be led,» he said.
«He has come right from the bottom and reached the top of his game. He has not done that by not being a very strong independent character.»
Joorabchian also defended the practice of third-party ownership, which has been banned in the Premier League amid concerns over its effect on fair competition but remains prevalent throughout Europe and South America. He claimed that it helped smaller clubs compete for players they would otherwise be unable to buy.
The Tevez issues comes at a bad time for City as they face an anxious wait to see whether Mario Balotelli and Sergio Agüero will be fit for the next match, at home to Aston Villa a week on Saturday.
Balotelli has pulled out of Italy’s squad because of a back problem and Agüero is likely to leave Argentina’s squad in the next 48 hours because of a groin injury sustained at Blackburn last weekend.
guardian.co.uk