Featured Image Credit: Getty
Topics: Liverpool, Diego Simeone, Champions League, Premier League
Josh Lawless
Topics: Liverpool, Diego Simeone, Champions League, Premier League
The Liverpool fan at the centre of the heated incident with Atletico Madrid manager Diego Simeone has received a previous ban from an incident on Steven Gerrard's final home game.
Simeone was sent off for going over to the Liverpool fans and becoming involved in an angry exchange on Tuesday night after Virgil van Dijk headed home the winner in Liverpool's 3-2 win.
He had to be held back by security and stewards and is facing a suspension for his conduct.
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The Argentine claimed that he was on the the receiving end of "insults" and "gestures" throughout the game - with viral footage showing one fan's reaction to Atletico's second goal celebrations.
“We are in a place where we don’t have a right to reply or react and it is never good when we react as managers," Simeone said in his press conference.
"But if there are comments against us, racism or insults, we can get angry or fight back so when we are getting insulted all the game, when they scored the third goal, he turned round and insulted me. I am a person, I am human.”
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He called for the fan to be identified and punished - but the supporter, Jonny Poulter, issued a response in a one-minute video - calling Simeone a "coward", denying that he said anything untoward but accusing a coach of "spitting at me".
"I've had messages on every platform, I don't know how many, of people saying, 'Oh what did he say, what did you say'. I never said nothing apart from, 'Hey, hey, f*** off,' we've won, basically, as you do," he said.
"Um, but that's what he done to us when they scored the equaliser. He and his assistant manager, giving it in front of us, and obviously he was getting called a s***house or whatever else."
However, it is not the first time Poulter was involved in an incident at Anfield.
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As per the Liverpool Echo, when he was 20, Poulter was hit with a three-year ban from attending football games after he hurled abuse at a disabled woman and her husband.
At Gerrard's final home game against Crystal Palace in 2015, David Higham had asked Poulter to move a banner blocking his wife's view after the Liverpool legend had received a guard of honour.
Higham's plea for the banner to be moved was refused by Poulter and he told the court that he felt “threatened and intimidated”.
6ft 4 Poulter said he felt "threatened" himself after Higham entered his "personal space" and admitted telling him, "This is the Kop, this is our tradition, this is what we do, if you don't like it there's the door you can f*** off."
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He is also said to have told the couple to "f***ing p*** off".
Poulter denied using abusive or threatening behaviour, insulting words to cause harassment, alarm or distress but Judge Richard Clancy at Sefton Magistrates’ Court told him "a reasonable court in this country that would find you innocent of this disgraceful offence."
Although an apology had been issued - as well as a handshake - at the first home game the following season, Poulter received a three-year ban on top of a £520 criminal court charge, £500 prosecution costs and a £60 victim surcharge.
Previously cautioned for trying to bring in smoke pellets to Wigan Athletic's Stadium in 2013, Poulter also had to serve a curfew between the hours of 9:30pm and 6am for an eight-week period.