Francesco Farioli comes in for fierce criticism after striking remarks about the refereeing around FC Porto v Benfica

Francesco Farioli beat Benfica 3-1 on Sunday and kept FC Porto's perfect record intact. Even so, he still came in for criticism. Benfica manager Marco Silva was unimpressed by the Italian coach's behaviour.

The former Ajax manager had already made comments about Portuguese refereeing before the match, and Silva did not take kindly to them. Farioli said that 'strange things' happened in refereeing terms in matches between Porto and Benfica.

Benfica defender Clément Lenglet picked up his second yellow card in the first half and had to leave the pitch early. "As for the red card, I'm not going to comment on that. If the club have something to say about the match, I think they should do that," said the former Fulham and Everton manager.

Still, he did address the remarks made by his FC Porto counterpart. Silva felt Farioli made those comments to influence the referee.

"I don't know if I can keep this up until the end of the season. I come from a different culture, but unfortunately here it is possible to influence referees before matches, after matches, during the week, in every conceivable way, and sometimes it even works. That does not happen in the Premier League," said the 49-year-old Portuguese.

Silva did not want to spend any more time on it. "I think Farioli is up next, so I would say: take your chance and ask him the question. He spoke yesterday, last week he spoke only about 'strange things', so you can join in the conversation, because of course you enjoy that," he said irritably.

Later, Farioli was asked whether things work differently in Portugal than in England. "I know nothing about that, because I have never worked in the Premier League," the Italian replied. "I think what I said last week was based on my feelings. And as I already said: I think nothing strange happened tonight, everything went well."