REAL Madrid's Cristiano Ronaldo has lost his appeal against the five-match ban which meant he was unable to play in last night's Super Cup final against arch-rivals FC Barcelona.
As well as the Super Cup, which his team won for the first time since 2012, the fiery Portuguese striker will miss the Liga matches against Deportivo A Coruña and Real Sociedad, both away games, and against Valencia CF and Levante at home.
The ban was slapped on 'CR7' after Real won Sunday's away match against Barça, during which the Ballon d'Or winner was yellow-carded twice in minute 81 and 82, leading to him being sent off.
He is accused of shoving the referee, De Burgos Bengoetxea, after the second yellow card for throwing himself down in front of rival Umiti.
The first yellow was for 'taking off his shirt after scoring a goal', the second of Real's three to Barça's one at Camp Nou.
He has been fined a total of €3,005.
Ronaldo was brought on in minute 58 of Sunday's game to sub Karim Benzema, and it took him just 21 minutes to clock up his first yellow card.
The second one, which saw him sent off, came three minutes later and, according to the referee, Ronaldo 'pushed him lightly' as a 'show of his disagreement'.
Real Madrid applied to the Appeal Committee on Monday against Ronaldo's second yellow card and the 'pushing' accusations, to try to get the five-match ban lifted.
But this failed, and the Committee ratified the initial verdict by the Royal Spanish Football Federation (RFEF)'s Competition Judge that the player's behaviour was 'unjustified' and 'out of proportion', being in breach of Article 96 of the Disciplinary Code.
Real's manager, Zinedine 'Zizou' Zidane is said to be furious at Ronaldo's sanction.
“I'm really annoyed, we're all really annoyed,” he stormed.
“I'm not going to have a go at refs in general, but when you look and see what's happened here, that Cristiano's not going to play for five matches, then something's clearly not right and I'm not happy about it at all.”
Zidane considers Ronaldo's second yellow card, which saw him thrown off the pitch, to be unfair, and has some understanding for the player's knee-jerk reaction at the time.
