Clint Dempsey facing three month ban for tearing up the referee's notebook

US captain lost his cool in the final minutes of defeat

Former Tottenham and Fulham striker Clint Dempsey is facing a three-month ban from football after he was sent off the other night.

The 32-year-old, captain of the US national team, lost his cool in the final moments of the Seattle Sounders' defeat to the Portland Timbers, getting booked before ripping referee Daniel Radford's notebook out of his hand and tearing it to shreds.

Seattle finished the game with seven men and Dempsey could miss up to three months because of the incident, which is classed in the same territory as assaulting a referee according to the US Soccer Federation.

The ban would rule Dempsey out until mid-September which would leave him out of the Gold Cup campaign for the national team as well as the majority of the remainder of the MLS campaign.