FILE PHOTO: Football - Birmingham City v Tyreso FF - UEFA Womens Champions League Semi Final First Leg - Autotech Stadium, Solihull - 19/4/14 Birmingham City coach Marcus Bignot Mandatory Credit: Action Images / Ed Sykes
(Reuters) - Former Birmingham City assistant manager Marcus Bignot has been handed a seven-game touchline ban for making homophobic comments about Tottenham Hotspur coach Rehanne Skinner during a Women's Super League (WSL) match in February, the Football Association (FA) said on Thursday.
The FA charged Bignot with "misconduct" and "aggravated breach" due to the homophobic nature of the comments in March but he denied the charges.
An independent commission confirmed the FA's initial charges and ordered a mandatory face-to-face education programme on top of the touchline ban, adding the charges could not be mitigated as Bignot had previously denied any wrongdoing.
"He has been found to have made a comment which was obviously homophobic and wholly unacceptable. It is particularly important that homophobic comment, the kind made by Mr Bignot, is punished severely," the commission said in a statement.
The commission was informed that Bignot had lost his job at Birmingham and also at Guiseley AFC due to the charges while his coaching role at England U-19 was suspended pending the outcome of the case.
(Reporting by Silvia Recchimuzzi in Gdansk; Editing by Christopher Cushing)
