Borussia Moenchengladbach fined striker Marcus Thuram one month’s salary, to be paid to a charity, on Sunday for spitting on an opponent the previous day.
“Marcus has accepted this and has also offered to engage with this social cause on his own behalf,” the club’s sporting director Max Eberl said in a statement.
Thuram was sent off after a video review showed him spitting in the face of Stefan Posch of Hoffenheim as the two argued during a Bundesliga match.
With Gladbach down to 10 men, Hoffenheim scored a late goal and won 2-1.
“Today something took place that is not in my character and must never happen.” Thuram, a 23-year-old France international, posted on Instagram after the game adding that the spit “occurred accidentally and not intentionally.”
“I apologise to everyone, to Stefan Posch, to my opponents, to my team-mates, to my family and to all those who saw my reaction.”
In addition to the club fine, Thuram faces a long ban from the German Football Association.
Eberl said he had a “long discussion” with Thuram on Sunday morning and that the player was “devastated”.
Thuram “told me that during a dispute with Stefan Posch, he had unintentionally spat after cursing several times in French in the heat of the moment. He knows that this doesn’t change anything and that the pictures speak for themselves, and that the sending off was the right call,” said Eberl.
“I have come to know him as a reflective person with a great demeanour,” said Eberl. “He remains the same person we know, and we will stand by him.”
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© Agence France-Presse
