Football Update: France Football Squad Suspended
In a startling development, the French Football Federation has suspended the national team after the ignominious defeat of the team in the first round of the World cup a tournament they won in 1998, and made it to the final of the 2006 event where they lost to Italy on penalties.
The 23-member French World Cup squad has been asked to clean up their act following the disastrous performance that was filled with one controversy after another.
Hence forth, the team would be regrouped before the country takes part in their next international match, and there are major overhauling expected by the football federation.
The decision was taken during a meeting of the FFF's Federal council, and it was taken upon the recommendation of new coach Laurent Blanc who replaces Domenech, who was the man who took the dispirited team to the 19th edition of the World cup held in South Africa.
There was plenty chaos in the tournament for the Les Blues, who never looked like a team that will do anything substantial in the tournament.
They were held to a nil-nil draw in their opening Group A match of the tournament, followed by a defeat against Central Americans, Mexico.
They had an outside chance of making it to the next round, but their hopes vanished when the team succumbed tamely to hosts South Africa, who recorded a famous win to send the Europeans crashing out of the biggest international tournament,
On the eve of the match with the hosts, the players' boycotted a training session in support of striker Nicolas Anelka.
Anelka was considered as a victim of the staunch policies by the temperamental coach, who claimed that the player insulted him and his behaviour was unbecoming of an international player, who was one of the stars in the French team.
The woeful performance also had an affect on the tenure of Domenech, who was sent packing after largely fruitless six-year tenure.
The new coach Blanc replaced Domenech, in the early part of last month in a bid to restore national pride of the 1998 world champions.
The new coach is expected to announce a largely new bunch of players who next month, before the team takes part in a match against Scandinavians Norway, in Oslo six days later.
Meanwhile the FFF's councils are also set to discuss the allegations of soliciting s*x with an under age prostitute against playmaker Franck Ribery and striker Karim Benzema.
On the other hand, some of the council members have also asked for action against Raymond Domenech.
"I will summon Raymond Domenech in the coming days. Unacceptable unethical things have happened. You understand that under the circumstances I can't tell you more. In the current governance, the responsibility of the Federation, as much as my responsibility, is at stake. We made mistakes and we let a situation slip, it culminated on June 20th with the bus of shame." said one council member.
The council added that the Federation fully approves Blanc's proposal to omit all 23 players selected by the French Federation for the World Cup.
The first real test for the new coach would be a Euro 2012 qualifier against Belarus, which is set to be played on the 3rd of September.
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