A Belgian soccer star was shown a red card for kicking a ball boy in the ribs on Wednesday.
Eden Hazard, who plays for Chelsea, apparently kicked the ball boy "when he didn't return the ball to him quickly enough in the final minutes of a semifinal game in the English League Cup," according to ABC News.
Hazard, 22, said he was just trying to retrieve the ball and that he didn't mean to kick the ball boy.
"The boy put his whole body on to the ball and I was just trying to kick the ball, and I think I kicked the ball and not the boy," he told Chelsea TV.
The ball boy, 17-year-old Charlie Morgan, visited Hazard in the locker room after the game to talk about what had happened. "We had a quick chat and I apologized and the boy apologized as well, and it is over," Hazard said, according to Reuters. "Sorry."
But Hazard can't put the whole fiasco behind him just yet. He will be banned from three games, and "there may be scope for that sanction to be extended," according to Reuters.
The incident ignited a heated debate among soccer fans. Some blamed the ball boy for the incident, saying he should have been quicker to return the ball to Hazard. Former Chelsea winger Pat Nevin said, according to the Guardian, "His job is to go and give the ball back. What does he do? He keeps the ball. His behavior was disgraceful."
But others insisted that even if the ball boy was in the wrong, it did not give Hazard the right to kick him in the ribs.