The French coach, who currently leads the Saudi national team, described that moment as a serious failure to take responsibility, noting that he would have imposed a harsh penalty on Diaz if he had still been the coach of the Moroccan national team.
Renard, who won the Africa Cup of Nations with Zambia and Ivory Coast in 2012 and 2015, told the French newspaper Le Parisien that although a missed penalty might be overlooked, he would not be lenient in such crucial situations.
Renard said, "Missing a penalty kick is acceptable, but in such cases, I am firm and I do not tolerate this."
He explained, "This is an insult to an entire country and an entire people who have strived to achieve success for 50 years."
The final match of the continental competition between the Moroccan and Senegalese national teams, which took place last Sunday at the Prince Moulay Abdellah Stadium in the Moroccan capital, Rabat, witnessed heated events in the final moments of regular time.
With the match tied at 0-0 in the sixth minute of second-half stoppage time, Morocco were awarded a penalty after Diaz was pulled down inside the Senegal penalty area.
The decision sparked outrage among the Senegalese national team, whose players threatened to withdraw from the match, before play resumed after an 18-minute stoppage, but the excitement was not over yet.
Diaz, the star of Real Madrid, stepped up to take the penalty and shot the ball in the style of “Panenka”, but it went very weakly into the middle of the goal, so that Edouard Mendy, the goalkeeper of the Senegalese national team, could easily catch the ball.
The punishment came quickly from the Senegalese team, who scored the winning goal during the first extra time period through a thunderous shot from their player Pape Gueye, crowning the "Lions of Teranga" with their second title in the tournament.
Diaz later apologized to the Moroccan fans for causing their disappointment, as they had been dreaming of winning the title for the second time in the history of their national team, which had won the championship only once before, in 1976 in Ethiopia.
