Brazilian defender Victor Gabriel has received one of the most controversial punishments in football history, suspended not for a fixed number of games, but until the player he injured fully recovers. The Brazil’s Superior Court of Sports Justice (STJD) handed down the ruling on Tuesday over a reckless tackle that fractured Cruzeiro forward Gabriel Pec’s tibia.
This incident happened during Internacional’s Serie A clash with Cruzeiro on July 22, when Victor Gabriel was shown a red card for the bad challenge. Cruelly, the injury came on Pec’s very debut for the club, just few weeks after his club-record $12 million move from LA Galaxy.
The court ruled that the usual suspension wouldn’t reflect the severity of the incident, ordering Victor Gabriel to stay suspended until Pec is medically cleared to return to training which is capped at a maximum of 180 days. This means his ban could end sooner if Pec recovers earlier, or last as long as six months if the recovery drags on.
Gabriel expressed remorse before the court, saying he apologized to Pec personally and insisted he had no intent to injure the player. The case took an odd turn after the Internacional’s own legal defense used an audio clip from match VAR communications that the club later admitted it couldn’t verify as authentic, leading to the court questioning the evidence.
The ruling can still be appealed overtime, but for now, Victor Gabriel’s return to the football pitch is tied entirely to another man’s recovery timeline, a punishment structure rarely, if ever, seen in the sport.
