Rodri Hernandez, the Ballon d’Or winner for Manchester City, discusses the contentious Vinicius Junior chants.

Real Madrid’s choice to skip the Ballon d’Or and several theories explaining why it wasn’t Vinicius Junior fueled the uproar surrounding the awarding of the prize to Manchester City player Rodri Hernandez in Spain. The vast majority of the global audience found that, but Rodri’s celebrations made matters worse.

Although the Spain star said he was not disheartened by the response in his native country, he was questioned about pictures that surfaced later that evening. Rodri declined to give it any thought, even though he and his celebrants were observed chanting “Ciao, Vinicius” to the tune of Bella Ciao.

People must realize that it is a private party and that the rivalry is healthy. If we installed cameras in every one of our homes… It’s simply another rivalry, and I didn’t to offend anyone. “I admire Vinicius,” he said to Cadena Cope.

He continues by saying that he would have placed Vinicius third and Dani Carvajal, a teammate from Spain, second. Whether Vinicius gives it any weight on his end will be evident the next time the two face up. The loss of the trophy was claimed to have sunk the Brazilian.