Maurizio Sarri on Koulibaly monkey chants: Italy has racism problem and must do more

"I am very sorry for Kalidou because he is a wonderful man. I am really very sorry for him. I think that in Italy we can do something more for this problem."

As a result of the chants, Inter have been punished with a two-match stadium closure, and boss Luciano Spalletti has condemned his side's fans' actions.

"I think it's only right to start by saying that my position is one of condemnation: no ifs, no buts," the Inter coach said at a news conference on Friday. "The time has come to say enough is enough."

Inter won courtesy of a stoppage-time winner from Lautaro Martinez -- 10 minutes after Koulibaly had been dismissed -- and Spalletti is disappointed that the abusers may believe they have influenced the outcome of the match.

"We need to be careful not to make people think that if they behave that way, they can have an influence on a result," he said. "We want to do things in a different way, like in other countries where you can't get a place in the stadium for all the people who want to go there, have fun and celebrate, including away fans."

On Friday, FIFPro and UEFA issued a joint statement condemning the chants aimed at Koulibaly and said they were "very concerned by this unacceptable racist incident and by what appears on the surface to be a failure to respect the widely-recognised three-step anti-racism protocol."

The statement added: "Koulibaly, a French-Senegalese defender, was subject to racist chanting and, despite announcements made by the stadium speaker, the chants did not stop. Moreover, it seems that Napoli's coaching staff had already informed the referee several times of racist chants."

Indeed, Napoli boss Carlo Ancelotti had said he asked the referee's assistant on three occasions to suspend the match due to the racist chanting, and that the next time his team would take matters into their own hands and walk off.

Roma manager Eusebio Di Francesco said on Friday that he was "100 percent in agreement" with Ancelotti, but Spalletti does not think walking off is the answer.

"Things don't change with just one gesture, but with the constant, daily effort to change things," he said. "Then, from this repeated, daily, continued gesture, it becomes normality, because these things have happened before."

However, Juventus boss Massimiliano Allegri said only the police can take the decision to suspend a match when asked for his opinion on the incident. He added that football should work with schools to "educate" children.

Meanwhile, AC Milan's Gennaro Gattuso said he agrees with the idea of stopping a match, but added that it was unfair to "attack" Italy as a country. He explained that similar incidents also occur in "other civilised countries."

Several players, including Liverpool duo Mohamed Salah and Sadio Mane, have come out in support of Koulibaly.

The Senegal international will now serve a two-match ban for the sending off -- one for an accumulation of yellow cards for the campaign, and the other for the dismissal.

However, Napoli's lawyer has said the club will appeal the second of the two yellow cards.

"We're looking into appealing," Mattia Grassani to Radio Kiss Kiss. "We will ask for just a one-game ban, basing our appeal on his applause, which was the reason for his second yellow card.

"You could hear the monkey chants, yet the referee did not feel it would have been right to interrupt the game. Probably a strong signal in the first half would have warned the fans and dissuaded the idiots from continuing with such behaviour, and then we would never have got to that gesture from Koulibaly."