Mexico ban eight players for indiscipline
Reuters - Tuesday 28 June 2011, 16:51
BUENOS AIRES - Mexico have been hit by
their second scandal this month after eight players in the
country's Copa America squad were suspended for six months for
indiscipline by the national football federation (FEMUXFUT ).
The players were caught breaching disciplinary rules at a
Quito hotel where the squad were staying on the way to the Copa
America in Argentina which starts on Friday.
The players involved are forwards Marco Fabian de la Mora,
Javier Cortes and Nestor Calderon, midfielders Jonathan dos
Santos (pictured), Jorge Hernandez and David Cabrera and defenders Nestor
Vidrio and Israel Jimenez.
"The players will be suspended for the next six months from
any national team call-ups," Hector Gonzalez, director of
national teams for FEMUXFUT, told a news conference in Mexico
City on Tuesday.
Those suspended, part of the under-23 squad including five
over-age players due to take part in the July 1-24 Copa America
as a guest team, were in Ecuador for a warm-up match.
Mexican media reported the players told coach Luis Fernando
Tena they had belongings stolen from their rooms at the Quito
hotel where the players had invited female guests.
"We reported the losses to the hotel [and] later found out
how it had happened," he said without elaborating at a news
conference at the team's Copa America base outside Buenos Aires.
Hotel manager Robert Ramia told the Ecuadorean news
programme Ecuavisa "we have video [footage] of women entering
the rooms area of the hotel with the Mexican team kit-man."
Gonzalez said: "I'm not going to give details of the facts,
regulations were breached and indiscipline committed.
"The players confessed, they regret it, offer their
apologies to the fans, coaching staff and directors and assume
the consequences of their acts."
The players have also been fined 50,000 Mexican pesos
($4,205) each.
EIGHT REPLACEMENTS
The suspended players were leaving for Mexico on Tuesday
with eight replacements flying into Buenos Aires on Wednesday
with Gonzalez, who said Mexico had been given permission to make
changes to the squad before handing in their official list.
The replacements have been named as defenders Kristian
Alvarez and Osvaldo Alanis, midfielders Ulises Davila, Diego de
Buen, Edgar Pacheco, Antonio Gallardo and Carlos Orrantia and
forward Alan Pulido.
Tena, Gold Cup coach Jose Manuel de la Torre's right hand
man who is in charge of the team in Argentina, said he was
surprised and upset by what had happened.
"It's lamentable, I didn't expect it, I was surprised.
"Now we must start [preparations] again," said Tena, a tense
look on his face revealing little as he added he was pleased
with the build-up during which Mexico beat Colombia and Ecuador.
It is the second scandal to hit Mexico in less than a month
after five squad members at the Gold Cup, which the Mexicans won
by beating hosts the United States 4-2 in the final on Saturday,
were suspended after testing positive for a banned substance.
FEMUXFUT has set out to prove that the five players, tested
at Mexico's training centre in mid-May, ate meat contaminated
with clenbuterol, a substance used to speed up and increase
muscle mass in animals.
Mexico were also embroiled in a case of indiscipline last
September when Carlos Vela and Efrain Juarez were suspended for
six months and a dozen others fined over a late-night party at
the team hotel in Monterrey after a friendly with Colombia.