Ajax’s Serbian winger Dusan Tadic provoked Feyenoord’s Turkish midfielder Orkun Kokcu for his Ramadan fast-breaking on the pitch Wednesday evening. Feyenoord’s Muslim players; team captain Kokcu and Oussama Idrissi from Morocco came to the touchline to replenish themselves by eating snacks to break their fasts nearly 30 minutes after the kickoff. In the meantime, other Feyenoord players drank water as the game was paused. In the second half, Tadic brought down Kokcu after a tackle and stepped on the Turkish player’s foot to lock horns with him. Following the barge between the duo, Tadic made a hand gesture to mock Kokcu’s mid-game fast-breaking as the game saw tense moments. Kokcu, 22, a Feyenoord regular, also represents Trkiye. Ajax visited Feyenoord to beat their opponents 2-1 in a Dutch Cup semifinal at Rotterdam’s De Kuip Stadium, and Tadic was among the scorers in the game. The winning team Ajax qualified for the final. Tadic refused to wear solidarity armband An Ajax player since 2018, Tadic, 34, earlier refused to wear “Pray for Trkiye and Syria” armband for a Dutch Eredivisie match. Under fire, he offered his condolences to the victims on Twitter. “The earthquakes in Turkey and Syria have shocked me deeply. My thoughts are with the people who have lost loved ones in this tragedy, and everyone affected in any way,” Tadic said on Feb. 14, a week after the major earthquakes. Tadic, a former Southampton winger, is a Serbian national football team regular who represented his nation in the 2022 FIFA World Cup. In a previous Ajax vs. Feyenoord match in March, called “De Klassieker” (The Classic), Kokcu refused to shake hands with Tadic, ignoring the Serbian player before the kickoff in Amsterdam. ‘De Klassieker’ is one of the biggest football rivalries in the Netherlands between Ajax Amsterdam and Feyenoord of Rotterdam.
Source: Anadolu Agency – English