By CNN
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Bayern Munich has “strongly condemn[ed]” racist abuse directed at defender Dayot Upamecano following the team’s Champions League defeat against Lazio.
Upamecano was sent off in the second half of Wednesday’s round of 16 game for a challenge in the penalty box on Gustav Isaksen, after which Ciro Immobile scored the subsequent spot-kick for Lazio.
That proved to be the decisive moment in the game as the Italian side went on to win 1-0.
After the match, racist comments were left on the 25-year-old Upamecano’s Instagram page, including verbal abuse and monkey and gorilla emojis.
“FC Bayern strongly condemn the racist comments being directed towards Dayot Upamecano on social media,” the club said in a statement posted on X, formerly known as Twitter.
“Anyone who comments hateful words such as these is no fan of our club. We’re all behind you, Upa!”
Bayern said that Upamecano doesn’t want to comment on the abuse at the moment. CNN has also contacted Meta, which owns Instagram, for a response.
Bayern had 17 shots against Lazio but failed to get one on target, falling to a second defeat in five days after losing 3-0 against Bayer Leverkusen on Saturday.
The back-to-back defeats increase the pressure on manager Thomas Tuchel, and Bayern will be looking to turn around the tie against Lazio when the sides meet for the second leg in Munich on March 5.
“Of course, we’re frustrated and angry about the defeat,” said Tuchel. “I don’t know why, but we lost the plot at halftime. We lost the game, it wasn’t that Lazio won it.
“It was a good first half. We had one great chance to score and two normal ones. But we ended up with no shots on goal and that means you can’t score either.”
Bayern, a six-time European champion, has failed to progress beyond the last 16 of the Champions League just once since the 2010/11 season, losing to Liverpool in the 2018/19 knockout rounds.
Five points behind Leverkusen in the Bundesliga, the club is also in danger of failing to win the German domestic league for the first time in 12 years.
